


falling for your love (it’s not easy baby)

by baeconandeggs, ohshn (gummybear1620)



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: (very) minor character, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Angst, Blood, Blood Drinking, Childhood Trauma, I totally made up a bunch of vampire lore and ran with it, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Romance, but also mini musicproducer!au??, dead bodies, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-05-20
Packaged: 2019-05-09 13:24:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 47,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14716896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baeconandeggs/pseuds/baeconandeggs, https://archiveofourown.org/users/gummybear1620/pseuds/ohshn
Summary: Park Chanyeol likes to consider himself an alternative sort of vampire: he doesn’t do mansions or capes or tacky dripping fangs. He likes playing pretend at being human, likes blending in and making music and doing what he loves. But then Chanyeol is called back to Korea as vampires begin to be murdered by an unknown threat. There, he meets hunter Byun Baekhyun, and he discovers that he must confront the past he’s been running from for the last ten years if he wants to keep Baekhyun by his side.





	falling for your love (it’s not easy baby)

**Author's Note:**

> **Prompt #:** BAE174  
>  **Disclaimer: baeconandeggs/the mods is/are not the author/s of this story. Authors will be credited and tagged after reveals.** The celebrities' names/images are merely borrowed and do not represent who the celebrities are in real life. No offense is intended towards them, their families or friends. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this fictional work. No copyright infringement is intended.
> 
>  **Author's Note:** Hello dear prompter! As you can probably tell, this prompt blew way out of proportion from what I was originally anticipating when I chose it. Nonetheless, I hope that you like it, and that it hasn’t strayed too much from what you envisioned for it! I had a great time writing it, and I hope that you all enjoy it as well :) the title of this fic and the lyrics at the beginning and end are taken from EXO’s [Fall](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWvZl5kYbFg) (tell me Fall was not written for this fic!!!!).
> 
>  
> 
> Other music mentioned in the fic: [Moon of Seoul](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSw54CVhq7M) (specifically Baekhyun’s version), [Stay with Me](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcJ2dXs6vro), [Freal Luv](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWDqy0zZAsY), and [You Are](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVX6DVVMy8s). For all EXO members’ Marks mentioned, I imagined them as being shaped like their superpower symbols. (you’ll see what I mean if you read the fic hehe)
> 
>  
> 
> Okay, enough from me! Without further ado, as promised, here’s vampire!Yeol and Baekhyun with a stake :)

_Even time was lost in this place_  
_Completely captivated by your light movements_  
_I couldn’t stop you spreading inside of me_  
_My eyes are only filled with you_

 _I can’t even breathe (it’s not easy baby)_  
_It gets deeper the more I try to escape_

 _Just like this, fall, fall, fall for you_  
_Into your swamp, fall, fall, I’m falling_  
_Endlessly_

 _My breath rises and locks_  
_It’s actually more comfortable, deeper_  
_Fall, fall_  
_I’m falling_

 

 

Of course, it all goes to hell the moment Chanyeol returns to Korea.

Maybe it’s the grueling twelve-hour flight from Los Angeles to Seoul. Maybe it’s the way the baby three rows behind him wouldn’t shut up for half the flight, or maybe it’s the way the woman in the window seat had to get up to use the bathroom six times in a row. Maybe it’s the fact that he still can’t get over his unsettling fear of heights (“but you’re a _vampire_ , hyung,” “and you’re a little _shit_ , Jongin”).

In theory, he can blame his current situation on any one of those reasons. But in reality, it’s probably because he kind of maybe accidentally forgot to feed before he got on the plane. And for a few days before that. Or has it been weeks? Time tends to blur together even on the best of days for Chanyeol – byproduct of an eternal life and all that – but it’s always been worse when he loses himself in his studio and his music. That combined with the rather urgent message calling him back to Korea, well, it’s sort of understandable.

If Sehun were here, he would be berating Chanyeol for forgetting to feed. (Even though Sehun’s no longer a newborn by any means, he still has the voracious appetite of a recently turned vampire. Thankfully, he also has Jongin now to keep him occupied.) As it is, Sehun is probably cursing Chanyeol for abandoning him without prior notice in Los Angeles.

The thirst snarls deep in his throat, a thick burn that simmers and grows with each passing second like a slow-banked fire. For a moment, it’s takes all of Chanyeol to remember to press his eyes closed against the flare of red, fingers biting into his palms as rational thought is driven back in favor of _need_.

The moment passes, but the burn doesn’t fade. He hasn’t felt thirst this demanding in years – no, decades – now, and the fragrant press of human scents and fluttering pulses in the enclosed space around him does nothing to help. Of course, he isn’t about to snap and massacre the whole plane, as tempting as it is to throttle the woman with the tiny bladder in the window seat. He refuses to revert to the animalistic behavior of newborns. Chanyeol is _better_ than that. If he’s going to feed, he’s going to do so properly. With manners.

(Massacres are so overrated, anyway.)

The next few minutes seem to stretch into a small eternity, but at last, he’s off the plane and in the airport. The relief is short-lived, however, as the cool, chemical-infused air of the airport only serves to diffuse the scents until they seep into every available surface like a particularly persistent virus. Chanyeol fails to mask his instinctive grimace in time to conceal it from the mother of the crybaby, who fixes him with an affronted look as she walks past. The little demon in her arms coos insultingly at Chanyeol, and he barely resists the urge to growl back with fangs bared.

 _No. Stop._ He draws in a shaking breath through his mouth and wishes he brought a mask. Not only would it have blocked out the worst of the smell, but then he could’ve also dropped the whole breathing act. Normally it doesn’t bother Chanyeol to play-pretend at being human – in fact, he enjoys it – but right now, breathing means smelling, smelling means craving, and it’s all just too much.

The plan is formed in the back of his mind before he even realizes it’s there, driven by thirst-fueled rationality. More casually than he feels, he heads to the nearest restrooms and leans against the wall next to the women’s bathroom. For lack of a better distraction and disguise, he pulls out his phone for the first time since landing in Korea. He doesn’t turn off airplane mode, partly because he hasn’t sorted out the data plan yet and partly because he doesn’t want Sehun doing something obnoxious like tracking him through satellite GPS. Unfortunately, without internet, Chanyeol discovers there’s a dismal lack of things to do on his phone without looking utterly suspicious, and resorts to taking several truly horrific selcas that will definitely _not_ be making it on his Instagram later. (Well, if he crops that last one and puts his favorite filter on it, maybe it’ll be okay—no, _focus_.)

He keeps one eye on the remaining passengers as they trickle past him, weary and travel-worn from the long flight. The bulk of the travelers have already made their way to customs, and now, only the stragglers and families burdened with young children are left. He dismisses all the families – much too conspicuous if one goes missing – and watches the solo travelers. Most are in too much of a hurry and look like businessmen returning from a trip abroad. Several other potential candidates are discarded, the poisoned taint of illness clinging obstinately to them like a bad perfume.

Finally, a young woman from his flight beelines toward the restroom. She’s clearly foreign, maybe from southeast Asia, and her lack of urgency means that nobody is waiting for her. A visitor, then, one that wouldn’t be missed for an hour or so. Better yet, she doesn’t smell of sickly sweet disease.

Saliva floods his mouth instinctively, and he swallows against the fire in his throat. A few more minutes, he promises himself, and the thirst backs down churlishly, reluctantly. Waiting.

It all happens very fast after that, almost on autopilot. She comes out of the restroom. Chanyeol slides his phone into his pocket and straightens. Smiles like he’s been waiting for her. Says something that she probably doesn’t understand, if the confusion in her eyes is any indication. Doesn’t matter. The thirst is clouding in on the edges of his vision now, and it unfurls into his voice in the form of glamour, thick and intoxicating.

“ _You want this,_ ” he tells her, and the mind control comes flowing back as easy as pretending to breathe. “ _Follow me._ ”

She blinks for a second as her mind instinctively fights the intrusion. But in the end, she bends, as they all do, as they always have.

It’s still early in Korea, so their section of the airport is mostly empty. He veers down a passage marked for employees only and settles for what appears to be a conference room. She follows him in and sits in a chair when he directs her to, eyes glazed, perfectly still. The door doesn’t have a lock, but no matter, it won’t take long. Just enough to sate his thirst. He has manners, after all, and he’s not about to leave her half-drained and hospitalized for the duration of her stay in Korea. That would be quite rude.

“It’ll be over soon,” Chanyeol promises, before layering the glamour back over his words. “ _Now be a good girl, and don’t scream._ ”

In retrospect, his greatest mistake is leaving his back to the door. (Or maybe it’s the fact that he let himself be driven to this brink of thirst at all.)

Either way, the thirst-induced haze in his mind clears almost instantly when something ice cold touches his throat. He freezes where he’s hunched over the girl, one hand tangled in her hair, exposing the vulnerable skin of her neck. His fangs retract automatically, even though he knows it’s much too late to hide anything now. Not with a stake pressed against his throat.

“Don’t move,” the hunter says from behind him in slightly accented English. “Let go of the girl.”

Chanyeol resists the urge to comment on the hypocrisy of the command – how is he meant to remain still if he has to release her? – but complies anyway. Better not risk his life any more than he already has. Sehun would be having a field day right now, he thinks a little wryly, before his hand slides out of her hair.

“Let go of her mind too,” says the hunter.

“I thought Korea’s hunter division was rather against the existence of vampires becoming common knowledge,” Chanyeol remarks back in Korean, and steadfastly refuses to flinch when the silver tip of the stake digs a little deeper into the soft flesh of his neck.

Without skipping a beat, the voice switches to flawless Korean. “We’ll take care of her memory, thanks.”

In any other situation, Chanyeol would’ve shrugged. Instead, he blinks, and relinquishes control over her mind. “Alright then. Done.”

“What? You didn’t even touch her.” There’s suspicion and something else Chanyeol can’t identify in the hunter’s voice. Disbelief?

“Didn’t need to. Check for yourself, then, if you don’t believe me,” Chanyeol suggests, and risks slanting a gaze from the corners of his eyes in an attempt to catch a glimpse of the hunter behind him. All he sees is a flash of silver, one that probably matches the glinted metal of the stake at his throat.

There’s a click and then a burst of static. “Hunter 506, requesting backup at Incheon. GPS coordinates are accurate. Urgency: mid-to-high. Circumstances: feeding, victim present and requires wiping.” There’s a beat of hesitation, then the hunter adds, “Note: subject may be able to control thought without contact.”

“Not ‘may,’” Chanyeol corrects out of habit. “I can. Do you want me to show you?”

“You wouldn’t get very far even if you tried. Don’t test me, vampire,” the hunter warns, voice dropping in a way that really should not send a prickle of interest curling down Chanyeol’s gut.

“I have a name, you know. It’s—” Chanyeol begins, but he’s interrupted by the startled, punch-drunk gasp of the girl sitting before him. Her eyes, clear and fearful, flicker nervously between him and the hunter, and then she starts to babble in some language that takes Chanyeol a moment to place. Thai?

The hunter curses behind him, and the stake presses a warning into his throat again. “Don’t move. If you do, I’ll stab you.”

Chanyeol believes him. He has no choice but to believe him, because thirst-frenzied or not, he should have been able to hear this man approach him. He should have been able to sense him – but he hadn’t, not until it had been too late.

So he stays perfectly still, and he’s treated to a full view of the hunter for the first time.

He’s small, smaller than Chanyeol would have expected from the force coiled behind the stake. He would fit in Chanyeol’s arms, tucked under his head, and the image sticks oddly in his mind before he can dispel it. The flash of silver comes from the hunter’s hair, which is dyed in a shockingly bright burst of gray. Everything about him is nice and soft, _pretty,_ from his petite features down to the tips of his elegant fingers, which are currently carding reassuring caresses through the girl’s hair. Everything except his eyes, that is, and it’s that which stops Chanyeol from plucking the stake from where it’s tucked, goadingly, into the back of the hunter’s jeans.

Chanyeol hasn’t seen eyes like that in a very long time.

It’s enough to make the thirst recede, temporarily, to the back of his mind again, where it lurks and stalks sullenly. He still can’t help but be hyperconscious of the blood rushing just beneath thin skin – it would be so easy to just sink his teeth in that pale, arching neck where pulse meets shoulder and drink, drink until he’s finally satisfied and this terrible craving leaves him. But no, that’s still the thirst-frenzy speaking, tainting his thoughts, and it’s with some difficulty that Chanyeol pushes it away for good.

Luckily backup, and further distraction, comes soon enough in the form of another human. Chanyeol senses this one approaching long before he actually arrives, which soothes his ego a little. Unfortunately, it also soon becomes clear that it’s because he had made no attempt whatsoever at concealing his presence.

The door slams open and ricochets off the wall. The first hunter looks up in annoyance, and the girl lets out a whimper. “Have you ever heard of _subtlety,_ Jongdae?”

“Drama is my middle name, Baekhyun,” Jongdae says back sweetly, sauntering into the room as if he hadn’t just narrowly avoided being smashed in the face with the door he’d slammed open. “And recklessness is yours. Commander Kim wants to talk to you once you’re back, you know.”

“Me? About what?” Baekhyun looks petulant, like a child, and Chanyeol presses down what would have been wildly inappropriate laughter. He probably would’ve ended up with a stake to the heart for his trouble.

“I don’t know, running off without your partner when you’ve been told over and over again _not_ to?” Jongdae scowls, eyebrows drawing together, before he gestures towards Chanyeol. “He could’ve been anything! As it is, you’ve risked more than enough! What if he took her as a hostage?”

At that point, Chanyeol has to speak up. He hadn’t been about to _kill_ her, just drink a little. “I wasn’t going to do anything to her. I really don’t see why this is necessary—”

“Shut up,” Jongdae and Baekhyun hiss at him in terrifying unison.

Chanyeol shuts up.

Jongdae sighs and produces a pair of handcuffs from his bag. Chanyeol can smell the bitter tang of the silver laced through the metal – not enough to burn, but enough to restrain him. “Look, we can talk about this later. Let’s just get back to the headquarters first so we can sort this out. This doesn’t automatically mean you’re under arrest, we just have to go through some paperwork and basic questioning and all that. Sorry, man,” he tells Chanyeol, and manages to look vaguely apologetic enough for it to work.

The handcuffs are cold against his skin, but not so tight that he can’t move his wrists. Small mercies. Jongdae gives an experimental tug on the lock to ensure that it isn’t loose, before he turns abruptly to face Baekhyun, shoulders squared. “I’ll take the girl.”

Baekhyun flinches slightly and steps in front of the girl. “I—I can do it.”

“No, you’re the one who went chasing off after this vamp, so _you’re_ the one going back to the station and dealing with the paperwork.” Jongdae drops the key to the handcuffs into Baekhyun’s palm and reaches past him to coax the girl into standing. “Come on, I’m sure you’re terrified. We’ll get you out of here.” He pauses at the door to add, “Don’t forget to see Commander Kim!” before disappearing down the hall.

There’s a beat of silence. Baekhyun looks inexplicably smaller without the girl to protect, and something flits across his features too quickly for Chanyeol to discern. He presses his thin lips together for a long moment before exhaling and pulling on a pair of sleek leather gloves with quick, practiced movements. His hand is steady and tremor-free where it lodges in the crook of Chanyeol’s elbow, and it’s surprisingly strong. “Let’s go.”

 

 

They return down the same hallway Chanyeol had come in through. The airport is still largely empty, though a few stray travelers give them odd looks and a wide berth when they spot the handcuffs bound around his wrists. With the sort of peculiar amusement that comes hand-in-hand with abnormal situations like this, Chanyeol can’t help but observe the way Baekhyun has to take one and a half strides for each of Chanyeol’s steps. It would be adorable if not for the way Baekhyun’s hand squeezes around his arm, tight enough to bruise, when he figures out very quickly the reason behind Chanyeol’s smirk.

Fifty-two steps later (seventy for Baekhyun, because he’d started lengthening his pace after noticing Chanyeol’s source of delight), they reach a rather discreetly placed elevator with a keypad and a fingerprint sensor. Baekhyun shoots a look at Chanyeol before shielding the keypad with his body.

“Don’t worry, I won’t peek,” Chanyeol promises, although it’s clear that Baekhyun doesn’t believe him. He pauses, trying to search through several somewhat hazy memories from the last time he’d been in this airport. “I don’t remember the hunter division being so... proactive ten years ago.” And by ‘proactive,’ he means he doesn’t remember them being prominent – or a threat – in Korea at all, and certainly not enough to warrant special security access at Incheon.

Clearly, Baekhyun understands, because the elevator doors open with a small ding and he yanks Chanyeol in with much more force than strictly necessary. The hard glare is back, fiercer than ever, and there’s suddenly something so _familiar_ about that belligerently stubborn expression that Chanyeol is taken aback. Baekhyun is saying something irrelevant about how in ten years, the hunters have progressed a lot, including implementing new rules about feeding and whatnot, but Chanyeol cuts through his speech just as the elevator begins to lurch downward.

“Sorry, have we met somewhere before?”

It’s quite irrational, and they both realize what it sounds like the moment it leaves his mouth.

“Are you trying to—”

“I didn’t mean it like—”

Their words crash against each other before stumbling to an awkward halt, and Baekhyun looks so affronted that Chanyeol feels like he should be a little insulted.

“No, I haven’t met you before,” Baekhyun finally says crisply as the elevator doors reopen and they step out into a dimly lit garage. “I would’ve remembered.”

Technically, _Chanyeol_ would be the one to remember, since he’s one hundred percent sure he’s been alive much longer than Baekhyun, but since Baekhyun’s last statement sort of sounded like a compliment, he lets it slide. Before he can say anything else, they’re approaching a sleek black car with tinted windows. Baekhyun opens the door to the backseat, and Chanyeol slides in first before, to his surprise, Baekhyun follows.

It’s clearly a car designed for holding vampires. He’s willing to bet that it’s enforced with steel, not that it’s essential; few vampires have the strength to bend the metal of a modern car. There’s also the unmistakable stench of hawthorn incense, which sends a burst of dizzying nausea spiraling through Chanyeol before he remembers to stop breathing again. Most interestingly, there’s a plated wall of silver-laced metal, clearly meant to separate the danger in the backseat from the driver.

Why, then, is Baekhyun back here with him?

Without any distinct signal from Baekhyun, the car begins to move with the same sort of smooth purr that Chanyeol would’ve greatly enjoyed if not for the irritating thrum of thirst humming deep in his mind. To distract himself, he turns to Baekhyun. Curious, curious Baekhyun, with his fragile wrists and stubborn eyes and a neck that looks as if Chanyeol can snap in two with the flick of his hand.

“You’re not afraid?” he asks, gesturing to the metal separation. “Of being back here with me?”

Baekhyun looks at him briefly before turning back to the window, silver hair washed flatly gray in the tinted light. “I’ve been in here with far more feral vampires than you. You’re not that special, don’t worry.”

“Ouch,” Chanyeol remarks lightly, settling more comfortably in his seat. “No wonder Jongdae thinks you’re reckless.”

Baekhyun stiffens slightly at that, and his elegant, glove-clad fingers twist together in his lap. Sore spot, then. “Someone has to save them.”

“Them?”

“The victims,” Baekhyun says, and his gaze burns sharp through Chanyeol. There’s something defiant there, and also something fiercely protective, as if he’s had this argument many times before. Chanyeol has met precious few humans who seem to genuinely care about the wellbeing of another to the point where they would risk their own lives for a pure stranger. Yet Baekhyun had run off after him without a second thought, without even knowing if Chanyeol was feral or not.

He’s always liked humans. It’s fun, watching them scurry around in their daily lives, working endlessly during their short time on Earth in an attempt to find something meaningful to occupy their days. But he can’t ever remember a time, in all his many years alive after being turned, of wanting to know _more_ about a human. Of wanting to know more about someone like Baekhyun.

The rest of the car ride passes in silence. Seoul is sleeker and taller than Chanyeol remembers, and far more people crowd the streets. It’s a different kind of vibe compared to the dichotomony of Los Angeles – which is always either ultra-glitzy or half-rundown – and, to his surprise, he finds that he’s missed it.

The building they finally arrive at is all reflective glass and sharp steel, much like the rest of the city. Chanyeol reads the name printed in stiff hangul above the set of revolving doors and can’t help but laugh. “The South Korean Ministry of Domestic Defense? Really?”

“It was the government’s idea. It’s a ridiculous name,” Baekhyun mutters, before throwing open the car door. “Get out. And don’t you dare run.”

“I can’t go anywhere anyway,” Chanyeol says, but complies nonetheless. The shift from dark car to bright sunlight is abrupt, and it takes longer for him to adjust than usual. He _really_ needs to feed. Soon.

Baekhyun’s hand is almost calming when it returns to grip his arm. “Come on,” he says, and he steers Chanyeol inside the thankfully much dimmer building. They enter the vast open space of a lobby, the glass ceiling arching high overhead. Sunlight still streaks across the floor in wide painted rectangles, but with the added dilution of the windows, it doesn’t affect Chanyeol as much.

Several hunters are scattered around the space, and they look up at Baekhyun’s entrance. Instantly, the whispers start, and Baekhyun’s hand tightens around his arm for one brief moment before forcibly relaxing. Chanyeol looks first at Baekhyun, then at the hunters closest to them, who all glance away with the conspicuous guilt of those caught mid-gossip, and he frowns. But before he can say anything, Baekhyun is marching them past the front desk and into a windowless corridor beyond it. The room they enter feels more like a conference room than an interrogation room, which either means that Baekhyun trusts him at least slightly or that the Korean government really has been funneling its money into the hunter division.

Since the latter seems rather impossible, Chanyeol decides to go with the first option. He also tactfully doesn’t mention the eruption of whispers that had occurred when they’d first entered the building. Baekhyun clearly doesn’t want to talk about it either, as he waves a hand at the plush, leather-backed seat across the table before closing the door and sliding off his gloves.

“The handcuffs stay on until we’re done with the processing,” Baekhyun says when he notices Chanyeol fiddling with them. He drops his gloves on the table and pulls out a form and a pen from the box mounted next to the door before sitting smoothly in the matching seat across from Chanyeol. “Let’s get this over with.”

Baekhyun slides the paper and pen across the table at the same time Chanyeol reaches forward to take it, and that’s when something strange happens. Chanyeol touches the pen just as Baekhyun is pushing it forward, their fingertips scant centimeters apart, and Baekhyun withdraws his hand in the smoothest flinch Chanyeol has ever seen. The same odd, burning curiosity rekindles in his chest, perking its head, and just to test out his hunch, Chanyeol picks up the pen before purposefully fumbling it and sending it tumbling towards Baekhyun’s side of the table. Out of pure instinct, Baekhyun reaches for it, but when Chanyeol’s hand follows the path of the pen, Baekhyun twists away and folds his hands under the table in a motion so even it would have looked natural and intentional had Chanyeol not been watching for it.

_Interesting._

Smiling quietly to himself, he picks up the pen again and examines the paper, satisfied.

Baekhyun doesn’t seem to sense that anything is wrong, though he does snap testily, “What are you smirking at?” His hands are still under the table, far away from any potential contact with Chanyeol.

“Nothing,” Chanyeol replies, before tapping the form. “So what do I do, Hunter 506?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“What, do you prefer I call you Baekhyun then?”

Baekhyun makes an expression like he’s swallowed a lemon, and Chanyeol can’t resist the laugh that bubbles out of his chest. This is probably the trickiest situation he has found himself in in decades, and it’s the closest he has come to thirst-frenzy in just as long, but at the same time – he doesn’t remember a time when he’s felt more alive. Closer to being human, to being what he once was.

It’s as odd as it is exhilarating. He thinks it’s a sensation he could get used to.

“Just fill it out. Name, age, current place of residency, affiliated coven – I’m sure you can read.” Baekhyun frees a hand to wave it in the air before propping his head up in his palm, elbow pressed against the table, previous reservations apparently discarded.

“Why so much paperwork?” Chanyeol comments while writing down his name in slightly unpracticed hangul. He’s gotten too used to writing in English since being in America.

“Bureaucracy,” is all Baekhyun says with a nose crinkle that Chanyeol really should not find as cute as he does.

The next box is age, and here, Chanyeol hesitates, pen hovering over the crisp white of the paper. Stalling, he says, “I could be lying to you for all you know. If I’m the one writing everything, you have no way of verifying it.”

“Forget about your ID?” Baekhyun raises an eyebrow. “We cross-check your ID with the form, as well as within the system. If you don’t lie, it makes everything a _lot_ smoother, trust me. Otherwise, we’re going to have to start digging deeper into why you lied, and that’s never pleasant. As it is, you’re going to have a strike against you for attempting to use glamour and trying to feed without consent, so I wouldn’t try anything funny if I were you.”

The rest of Baekhyun’s words fade out as Chanyeol fixates on his first comment. _My ID?_ There’s a sinking feeling in his stomach as he tries to recall if he had packed his ID during his mad rush to Korea. It’s not a good sign when he can’t even remember the last time he’s seen his Korea-issued vampire ID. He’s pretty sure it might be lodged in some corner in the depths of his extra closet, but it might as well be at the bottom of the ocean for all the help that it’ll do him now. It’s not his fault – he needed it once to enter America, and after that, nobody had bothered to re-verify him over the course of the ten years he had spent there. After all, when he had first gone to America, he hadn’t been planning on returning to Korea – ever. And then when he had finally come back, he had been yanked through some unofficial door by Baekhyun. As it is, his ID is probably so outdated that he doubts he’s even in whatever electronic system the Korean government has running now.

And he knows, without a shadow of doubt, that he cannot let Baekhyun know how old he is. Perhaps his name has already been erased from human history – he’s never been interested in meddling with petty human wars and drama like some of his acquaintances – but his age is a dead giveaway that he isn’t one of the dime-a-dozen vampires living and thriving in Seoul. He’s already messed up enough in his first hours back in Korea, and he can’t risk word getting out that he’s returned like it will if he lets his age slip. Not if the message from Kyungsoo is true, because far too much is at stake if it is.

This all passes in Chanyeol’s mind between one nonexistent heartbeat and the next, and his eyes fix on Baekhyun’s. He can only see one way out of this. It’ll be a pity to lay as heavy a glamour as he is about to on the most fascinating human he’s met in centuries, but there’s simply no other choice. Leaving only one human under glamour is better, in any case, than leaving the whole building under glamour, he tries to convince himself, despite the small unfamiliar prickling of guilt in his chest. Because no matter how strong Baekhyun’s mental defenses are, there is simply no way he can withstand the mind-touch of a vampire as old as Chanyeol.

Something must cross Chanyeol’s face, because Baekhyun frowns and crosses his arms. “You _do_ have an ID, right?”

“Ah... about that,” Chanyeol begins, before sighing. Why is he even bothering to explain himself? Baekhyun won’t remember this – maybe won’t even remember _him_ – in a few seconds. Steeling himself, Chanyeol says, “I’m sorry,” and starts to reach out with his mind when the door slams open for the second time that day in a moment of remarkable serendipity.

“How many times do I have to tell you not to run off on your own, Byun Baekhyun—”

All three of them freeze, but for very different reasons.

Baekhyun has the same sheepishly guilty expression on his face again, the sulky pout of someone who’s been reprimanded for the same mistake several times and still hasn’t learned his lesson. Something a little like relief lifts off Chanyeol’s chest, and he calls the glamour back into the safety of his mind before turning his attention to the newcomer.

The human standing in the doorway is frozen, one hand still clenched around the brass handle of the door. His mouth closes and opens a few times, and he finally says incredulously, “Park Chanyeol, is that you? You’ve returned?” At Chanyeol’s puzzled silence, he continues, breaking into a beaming smile. “It’s me! Kim Junmyeon! You saved my mother from a feral attack twelve years ago.”

At that, a distant spark of recognition flares to life in the depths of his memory: a thin, gangly human boy, still trapped in that awkward in-between stage of adolescence, thanking him sincerely over and over in deep, ninety-degree bows. The same earnest expression that Chanyeol had assumed would vanish with life and experience is still unexpectedly present, although his voice and body has changed inevitably over the course of the years. Now, Junmyeon is handsome and tall, and Chanyeol finds that he feels no surprise that he has become the hunter division’s new Commander. The weight of Junmyeon’s position rests assuredly on his shoulders like a mantle he was born to wear.

“Congratulations on being made Commander. Impressive, for being so young,” Chanyeol compliments honestly, remembering the stodgy old man who Junmyeon replaced. He had been unpleasant to deal with, and even Chanyeol had given up on ever negotiating some sort of peace treaty between the two sides with him.

“Thank you.” Junmyeon accepts the praise graciously, smile softening, before he turns to Baekhyun, eyebrows knitting together puzzledly. “Why is Chanyeol in handcuffs?”

At this, Baekhyun sputters back to life, having watched their exchange with increasing confusion. “What do you mean? He was about to feed from someone in public without their consent!”

“Ah.” Junmyeon frowns a little, before finally entering the room and shutting the door behind him. He leans against the smooth, polished wood, arms crossed. “I forget that the regulations against vampires have changed significantly since you’ve been gone, Chanyeol. But—we can discuss that later. For formality’s sake, just fill out the form. I know you’re not in the system, so we’ll have to update that, but...” Chanyeol mumbles something quietly. “Sorry, what was that?”

“I may have forgotten my ID,” Chanyeol repeats louder, purposefully not meeting Baekhyun’s judgmental stare. “In America.”

“Ah,” Junmyeon says again, a note of hesitation in his voice. “Well... I can vouch for you. I still owe you for my mother’s life, after all, and this is the least I could do.”

Baekhyun stiffens and lets out a noise that can only be called an indignant squawk. “Commander Kim! With all due respect, we cannot—”

At the same time, Chanyeol’s mind whirrs to life as a spark of inspiration hits him. He had been worried previously since, should his age and status slip out through the hunter database and rumor mill, it would have inevitably reached _her_ sooner or later. But as long as he keeps his true age hidden and stays out of the digital system – which the vampires are no doubt monitoring, knowing how paranoid they all are – there should be no problems for now, at least, until he has a chance to talk to Kyungsoo. Better yet, she would never suspect to look for him here, hidden right in the middle of the hunters.

For once, Chanyeol thanks his forgetfulness.

“No need, Commander,” Chanyeol cuts off Baekhyun mid-tirade. “I wouldn’t want you to risk your position defending me. I don’t mind staying until a new ID can be issued, or I could ask one of my coven to bring it from America. He’s a little busy, so it may not arrive for a few weeks, but I’m sure he wouldn’t mind the trip back home as well.”

“You’ll have to stay here until it arrives, though,” Junmyeon says, still so achingly truthful. “I’m sure you have places to be.”

“I have all the time in the world. Where else would I go?”

At last, Junmyeon nods slowly. “Alright then, if that’s okay with you. We’ll put the case on hold for now, Baekhyun. If you could unlock him and go prepare a room for Chanyeol to stay in?”

Baekhyun looks like he desperately wants to say something, anything, but he only bites his lip and unlocks the silver handcuffs with deft, delicate motions. He still doesn’t touch Chanyeol, even when he reaches around him to gather the paper and pen.

Baekhyun stands, back ramrod-straight, and seems to debate for a moment before looking at Junmyeon again. His Korean is stiff and formal in a way that sounds odd and unnatural rolling off of Baekhyun’s tongue. “Sir, I do not feel entirely comfortable knowing that a vampire is walking unrestrained among all of us. There are more than just hunters here – there are civilians and children. He can control minds without touch as well, and that—”

“Baekhyun.” Junmyeon only says his name, but Baekhyun is silenced instantly. “Do you trust me?”

“Of course I do,” he answers immediately.

“Then all I ask is for you to show it.”

Baekhyun is quiet for one long second, before finally, he bows to Junmyeon. “Yes. Commander.”

The chair scrapes against the ground as Baekhyun leaves the room. Everything instantly feels smaller, flatter, and Chanyeol takes in an unnecessary, false breath to steady himself at the strange sensation. To occupy the empty space, he says, “He’s loyal.”

“When it counts, unfailingly so. Otherwise, unfortunately not.” Junmyeon chuckles, before beckoning. “Come, now, Chanyeol. We have much to discuss.”

 

 

As it turns out, much has changed since Chanyeol was last in Korea.

After gaining the support of the government, the hunter division had been allowed to implement the electronic ID system and several other rules restricting vampire activity. Previously, a rocky compromise had existed between the two sides: as long as the vampires remained undetected and sane when feeding, refrained from draining or turning the victim, and wiped all memories thereafter, they had been allowed to do as they wished. It was a system Chanyeol was all too familiar with, and one that he was aware gave vampires a distinct advantage. But it was one that had been unchallengeable and unchangeable, or at least so he had thought.

Under Junmyeon, however, a strictly enforced system had become commonplace. Feeding of any sort without consent became forbidden, especially with the use of glamour. Blood banks had been set up as conciliation instead, with options of both blood bags and willing volunteers. A much more concentrated effort to track turners had been implemented as well. Then again, turning without consent has always historically increased the potential of a newborn turning feral, so it doesn’t surprise Chanyeol that the hunters have finally cracked down on that as well.

“Of course, there’s no possible way to keep track of every vampire’s feeding habits. We do our best by monitoring their blood bank activity, and if one fails to show up for a few weeks and hasn’t registered a blood partner, we send someone to check it out. It’s difficult, but I do believe it’s a much healthier system than before for both sides. Vampires receive the benefit of a constant supply of blood, and we can better protect the humans from being turned or drained.” Junmyeon says this all with the conviction and quiet pride of someone who has watched their child grow into an adult, a small smile on his face.

The thing is, it _is_ a system that works. It’s a system similar to the one that America has been using for years now, although in America, vampires have always been more of an open secret than anything else. So it isn’t a shock that Junmyeon has begun to implement similar measures in Seoul.

What worries Chanyeol is how Junmyeon has been able to make it so commonplace, so quickly – why hadn’t the vampires attempted to resist? It isn’t like the vampires he had known to bow down and be shackled by those they considered weaker, insignificant, without putting up a fight, and Junmyeon had mentioned no wars between the two sides.

Chanyeol frowns, cradling the half-empty cup of blood in his hands. Junmyeon had given it to him from the headquarters’ storage bank after Chanyeol had casually mentioned that he wouldn’t mind a drink (failing to add, of course, how close he had come to thirst-frenzy). The taste is sweet on his tongue, but there’s an unmistakable flatness to it. He doesn’t mind, having long grown used to blood bank bags while in America, but it undeniably lacks the vibrancy that comes with drinking fresh from the source, and Chanyeol knows, _he knows_ , that this is not something the traditional vampires would’ve accepted.

He thinks of Kyungsoo’s message again, and a quiet foreboding rises like a dark cloud in the back of his mind.

“How have your recruitment rates been recently?” Chanyeol asks instead. He knows that in the past, most of the new hunters had been forged from feral attacks and devastation, lost friendships and families ripped apart. It was what made Junmyeon into the hunter he is today, living proof of the odd strength of human resilience.

Junmyeon hums. “They’ve increased rapidly in the past few years, actually, despite the decrease in vampire-related attacks. We have a strong and loyal network, so a lot of our new recruits have mostly trickled in via family ties.”

“Baekhyun, too, then?” He blames his curiosity on Baekhyun’s leather gloves and his harsh eyes, on the momentary overwhelming sense of déjà vu familiarity from the airport that he still hasn’t quite shaken off.

“No, not Baekhyun.” Junmyeon sighs, sadness flitting across his face. “He was involved in an attack when he was young. He survived, but his parents did not. His brother was newly turned, and it... well, we didn’t have the measures we do now back then.”

It’s a common story, Chanyeol knows, among hunters, yet something like pity still falls into place deep in his chest. Pity he knows Baekhyun wouldn’t want, but pity nonetheless. “But he’s overcome it.”

“Yes. Almost.” Junmyeon motions vaguely to his hands, before shrugging. “But this isn’t my story to tell. Regardless, he’s one of our best. A little reckless, as you’ve noticed, but he has a purer heart than I’ve seen among many of the hunters here.” There’s unmistakable fondness in his voice.

Junmyeon turns the conversation away from Baekhyun after that, to Chanyeol’s slight disappointment, and asks about his time in America instead. Chanyeol edges around the topic of his return, and Junmyeon doesn’t push it. They talk until the sun settles low on the horizon outside of Junmyeon’s office window, and the sunburnt glow paints slats of orange light across the desk between them. It’s with a slightly strange sense of bemusement that Chanyeol realizes the depth of Junmyeon’s trust in him – and all just because Chanyeol happened to be in the right place at the right time a mere twelve years ago. It’s a trust that he finds he wishes he could reciprocate fully, but there are some secrets that even Junmyeon must not ever find out.

He knows Junmyeon thinks that Chanyeol is around a century old, maybe a few decades more or less, still worn soft and empathetic by his memories of humanity. He imagines telling him the truth, that Chanyeol is actually probably more than five times as old as Junmyeon believes him to be. He imagines telling him that he can’t even remember his mother’s touch or his father’s voice or what it felt like to be loved unconditionally in the way only humans can manage. He imagines telling him that there are far older and far more dangerous vampires out there than Chanyeol, and that he should be careful, that he’s playing with fire.

But – he can’t. He can’t bring himself to say it, and he finds that even more than that, he doesn’t _want_ to betray Junmyeon’s trust, however misplaced it is.

Instead, Chanyeol stands when Junmyeon does, placing the empty cup carefully on his desk. He smiles and plays pretend at being human, breathing when he doesn’t need to and licking the blood carefully from his teeth. “Well, I have to say, this wasn’t quite the way I was imagining returning to Seoul, but hey, at least I got a free ride.”

Junmyeon laughs, full and hearty. “Make sure you thank Baekhyun later, then. In fact, you should go and find him now so he can show you your room. He should be in the cafeteria around this time, but if he isn’t, he likes to go to the roof to watch the sunset. Don’t tell him I told you, though. I pretend I don’t know.”

“Do you want me to send him to you later?” Chanyeol remembers the many times Jongdae had reiterated the extent of Commander Kim’s fury at yet another one of Baekhyun’s reckless acts.

“No, it’s fine. I just... worry about him at times. He doesn’t get along too well with many of the hunters here. He misses his brother, too, although he’d never say it or show it with the way he chases after vampires.”

Chanyeol had a sister, once, or so he thinks. He doesn’t remember her, but sometimes, when he sleeps, he wakes to an aching, fading sensation of hands ruffling through his hair and fingers curled through his.

“I won’t say anything,” Chanyeol promises. “Thank you again, Commander.”

“Call me Junmyeon. I’m sick of being called Commander all the time by people older than me.” Junmyeon waves a hand before settling back in his chair. “Now go, I only have a mountain of paperwork to deal with before I’m off for the day.”

Chanyeol smiles, and he’s reminded, again, of the unnecessary honor and graciousness of humankind, the simple respect that vampires have grown to callously hate.

He bows his head, and says, “See you then, Junmyeon.”

 

 

He finds Baekhyun on the roof.

For a moment, all Chanyeol can do is stand there and stare, frozen not because of the power of a dying sun, but because of the way the light dances in flickering shadows across Baekhyun’s face, the way the wind riffles through strands of hair tinted orange with the sunset. There’s something quiet and solemn about Baekhyun as he leans, elbows on the iron-wrought railing, and stares out at the city of Seoul laid bare before him, deep in thought.

Chanyeol unintentionally takes a step forward, and at the sound of his footstep, Baekhyun’s gaze slides to his, slow and unhurried like molasses. They stare at each other for one long second, before abruptly, Baekhyun’s eyes shutter closed and he straightens, back ram-rod straight, mouth tight.

The moment passes.

“What are you doing here?” Baekhyun demands, edging backwards along the railing when Chanyeol approaches.

“Thought I’d get some fresh air,” Chanyeol responds casually, mirroring the pose Baekhyun had adopted only heartbeats ago. The hunters’ building is much higher than he had expected, enough to afford a decent view over Korea’s capital and the constant thread of cars inching along the narrows streets below. A stiff distance remains between them, one that he’s tempted to try and close if only to see how Baekhyun will react. But Chanyeol didn’t come to the roof to alienate Baekhyun, to scare him away, so he stays still and doesn’t touch.

From the corner of his eyes, he can almost see the debate rage in Baekhyun’s head; give up his favorite spot to a vampire, or stick it out for a few more minutes in order to see the sunset? At last, Baekhyun heaves a sigh and turns to face the city again, slumping against the railing.

Chanyeol is half-expecting the rest of the evening to pass in frigid silence, so he’s surprised when Baekhyun mutters, a minute later, “So how do you know Commander Kim?”

The memory is still murky, to be honest, even after Junmyeon had refreshed him on it. The couple years before he had moved to America had been – not good for Chanyeol, to say the least. It’s not a time he likes to remember, filled with gnawing uncertainty and undeniable guilt. Even ten years hasn’t been enough to erase it. He answers honestly, “I saved his mother from a feral attack twelve years ago. He managed to track me down afterwards just to thank me. I don’t remember much of it.”

“You didn’t have to save her, though,” Baekhyun says. When Chanyeol turns to him, confused, he continues, “The Commander has always been very outspoken about giving vampires a second chance. He would always go on endlessly to anyone who would listen about the one who saved his mother.”

“Did he?” Chanyeol thinks back on it and laughs a little. He wishes, more than ever, that he deserves all of Junmyeon’s trust. “I just happened to be there. There’s nothing more to it than that.” He isn’t a saint, and he doesn’t deserve the way Baekhyun is looking at him now either.

“You could have turned a blind eye, or killed both the feral vampire and her in the name of self-defense. You didn’t have to save her,” Baekhyun repeats, stubbornly. “That, at least, counts for something.”

_Someone has to save them._

Chanyeol has never wanted to believe in something more.

Baekhyun draws in a sharp breath before releasing it. “I... I want to apologize, too, for the way I acted earlier. It was uncalled for.” The stiff Korean is back, and Baekhyun’s face is turned away. “I would not have acted in such a way if I had known who you were.”

 _You still don’t know who I am_ , he wants to correct, but instead, he says, “Don’t apologize. Those are the instincts that save lives. Junmyeon said you’re one of his best, after all.”

Maybe it’s just the reflection from the sun as it slips down its final inches towards the horizon, but a faint pink flush seems to bloom across Baekhyun’s cheeks. “He’s a liar. I’m reckless and that’s it.”

“He’s proud of you.”

The pink extends to the pale nape of his neck, the tips of his ears, and Chanyeol wants to _touch_ – but he can’t bring himself to ruin this tenuous relationship rebuilding itself between them before it’s even begun.

The sun finally winks and vanishes in the distance, taking the warmth of the day with it. Chanyeol feels no marked difference, having regained his resistance to the sun with the replenishing of blood, but when he sees Baekhyun shiver in the dusk, he straightens and gestures to the door. “Junmyeon told me you would be able to direct me to my room.”

“Right. To the dungeons we go,” Baekhyun says, standing as well. Chanyeol blinks for a few moments, mouth open, as Baekhyun holds his dumbfounded stare challengingly before finally crumpling into a laugh. It’s bright even without the sun to light it up, and sparks ricochet through him. “It’s a joke, Park Chanyeol. We don’t have dungeons here. Holding cells, sure, but we aren’t that old-fashioned.”

Baekhyun opens the door and arches an eyebrow at Chanyeol, beautiful and devastating all at once. “Coming?”

Something dizzying sweeps through him, an endless freefall of intoxication and desire. He wants Baekhyun, this puzzling human who won’t touch him but will look straight through him with eyes like fire and steel. He wants to taste his blood and mark his skin, but even more than that, he wants to keep him, to learn what makes him so proud and so fierce and so selfless and so _human_.

The feeling swells and swells before it passes, and he can move again. He retracts his fangs firmly before smiling and pushing off from the railing.

“Of course.”

And though he doesn’t know it then, that is how Park Chanyeol falls in love for the first time in five hundred years – and though it may be the first time he falls in love with Byun Baekhyun, it will be far from the last.

 

 

Baekhyun shows him to a room on what must be fifth or sixth floor. Although all the doors they pass are tightly closed, he doesn’t sense any life energy behind them. It must be a floor either built for holding vampires or kept for hunters’ families.

“These rooms are used in case we reach capacity,” Baekhyun explains, as if reading Chanyeol’s mind. He stops in front of a door and produces a key. “Most of the hunters with families like to live elsewhere, though.”

Maybe it actually is that, or maybe Baekhyun still just doesn’t trust him fully. Hell, even Chanyeol wouldn’t trust himself, so he can’t fault Baekhyun for that. Either way, no silver lines the doorway and no hawthorn incense poisons the air of the room, so it’s good enough for him; he much prefers the privacy of an empty floor, in any case. He wonders if he can possibly requisition another room to convert into a studio. If he’s going to stay here for longer than just temporarily, he might as well work on his music.

Baekhyun sets the key on the table just inside the door while Chanyeol places his lone suitcase next to the bed. When Baekhyun doesn’t leave immediately, Chanyeol turns to face the door, head tilted inquisitively. “Do you want to come in?”

Baekhyun hesitates for a second, long fingers dancing on the polished surface of the door, before he says, “No, I just wanted to let you know – if you need anything, I’m on the floor above. I’m at the end of the hall, facing west.” He pauses again before adding, rushed, “I thought you might enjoy being by yourself more than being surrounded by hunters who would rather pry into your business. I – I get it.” After that, Baekhyun nods jerkily and closes the door, footsteps fading fast down the muted carpet of the hallway.

Chanyeol stands there for a moment longer, still staring at the now closed door bemusedly. Finally, he shakes his head and turns to face the bed. There’s a flash of movement in the periphery of his vision, and when he raises his head, he sees a plain, golden-edged rectangular mirror set on the wall opposite the bed. Silver has long since fallen out of fashion when designing mirrors, so his reflection gazes back at him, uninhibited by the metal. There’s a smile on his lips, and he touches them absentmindedly, wondering when it had appeared in the first place.

The bed is plush and inviting and folds him into its softness when he flops, face-down, on the covers. He’s no longer under the haze of the thirst-frenzy, but he is still far from quenched; one little cup wasn’t going to undo weeks of starvation, after all, especially not after he had expended the effort to use glamour. Normally, if Chanyeol was careful and stayed inside, he could easily go weeks without drinking, especially if he took time to sleep and conserve even more energy – which is exactly what his routine had been before he had rushed haphazardly on a twelve-hour flight to Korea. Unfortunately, that had been the trigger, and the thirst still swirls deep down, pacing like a half-sated tiger.

It’s not as bad as it used to be, or as it would be if Chanyeol were younger. With age comes tolerance; while newly turned vampires often had to feed at least three times a week, they usually quickly grew used to handling the thirst, as long as the one who turned them didn’t abandon them. Even Jongin, barely half a century old, only has to drink weekly.

Sehun, on the other hand, is insatiable. Chanyeol smothers a laugh into the blankets before turning onto his back, blinking at the blank white of the ceiling. He should probably update Sehun tomorrow before he rips apart Chanyeol’s studio in vengeance, if he hasn’t done it already.

He settles more comfortably on the bed. He’s too lazy to get off and adjust the covers, so he pulls the blanket up and around him instead in the semblance of a warm cotton cocoon.

They call it ‘sleep,’ partially out of sentiment and partially for the lack of a better term, but it’s not so much sleep as meditation. Chanyeol isn’t truly unconscious when he sleeps, not in the way humans knock out and wake up bleary and disoriented the next morning. Everything still slows down to a sluggish crawl – he doesn’t breathe, doesn’t move, doesn’t do anything really except look like a frozen corpse. It’s a prolonging, a way to conserve their energy and temporarily offset their thirst, a way to stop living for something for which time has already stopped forever. Not many vampires sleep, as far as he knows, especially not the younger ones, but there’s something about it that calls to Chanyeol, maybe because it’s the closest to dreaming he will ever get again.

Of course, it’s not as effective as deep sleep, but deep sleep is for those who have already grown so tired of existing and seeing the world wear by that all they want to do is fall into stasis and let time leap forward without them. Chanyeol has never slept deeply, and he knows very few vampires who have, but there’s a vague, impossible hope that maybe that’s where the vampires he used to know went now, sleeping instead of hiding and waiting.

Then the sleep truly takes over, and he’s floating in a suspended pool of darkness, only half-aware of the infinite flickering lights present around him, glowing with life and blood and energy. Everything passes too quickly and too slowly all at once, a kaleidoscope of blinking stars and swirling murmurs. At one point, he thinks Junmyeon stops by his door and even Baekhyun, but that’s probably just his wishful thinking, because he doesn’t think Baekhyun would visit out of his own volition.

Two days later, he wakes up.

 

 

Chanyeol knows instantly how long it’s been, down to the second, when he opens his eyes.

There’s none of the blurry in-between daze that humans experience when waking; there’s only sleep and then awareness, as sharp a contrast as black and white. Chanyeol lies for a moment longer, cocooned in the same exact position he had been in fifty hours ago when he had laid down to sleep, before he finally pushes the blankets aside and sits up.

It’s a bit longer than he’s used to, but then again, he doesn’t usually refrain from drinking for weeks before suddenly pushing himself past his limit.

He stands and is about to head outside when he suddenly looks down at his rumpled, now three-day-old clothing. Even by his standards, this is a little gross, and this is coming from someone who has holed up in his studio for over thirty-six hours before without leaving once. His body no longer secretes the sweat and oil and fluids that make up the bulk of human scent, but that doesn’t mean he’s unaffected by the flavors of the outside world. His sweatshirt smells like the airport and strangers, and a little bit like Baekhyun’s leather gloves and Junmyeon’s office. The last two scents aren’t so bad, but the rest makes his nose crinkle in disgust, so Chanyeol heads into the adjoined bathroom to take a shower.

The water is hot and steady on his back, and it takes some effort to finally pull himself away from its silky warmth. He wraps one of the fluffy white towels hanging on the rack next to the shower around his waist, and that’s when he hears the faint knocking.

Chanyeol pulls open the bathroom door, and the knocking increases in magnitude.

“Coming!” he calls, before walking over to the front door in three large strides and pulling it open.

Baekhyun takes a startled step back, although Chanyeol can’t tell if he’s surprised because of the sudden lack of wood beneath his knuckles or because of Chanyeol’s half-naked appearance. There’s an awkward moment of silence, and he can see the way Baekhyun’s eyes track down his bare chest and torso before they both look away in flushed embarrassment.

 _Why am I embarrassed?!_ He shouts at himself inside his head. _I work out for a reason! My abs are beautiful! Even Sehun says so!_

Coughing, Chanyeol props open the door halfway with his hip, and he says, “Did you need something?”

“Just wanted to check that you were alive. You weren’t answering the door for two straight days, so I got a little—I mean, I thought maybe you snuck out or something and just ran away.” Baekhyun’s gaze finally centers back on Chanyeol’s eyes, determinedly not straying any further down.

“You could’ve just opened the door. It wasn’t locked,” Chanyeol points out.

“I wouldn’t have done that! That’s rude,” Baekhyun says, a little insulted. He crosses his arms, and something rustles in his other hand. “Oh yeah. Here. This is for you.” He holds out another small bag of blood, and Chanyeol automatically reaches out a hand to take it.

“Thank you,” he says, and smirks a little when Baekhyun stares at his arm as he takes lowers the bag. “Like what you see?”

Baekhyun flushes and sputters, “What—no—I was just wondering what happened here?”

He reaches out a hand and stretches it towards Chanyeol’s bicep, but at the last second before contact, Baekhyun seems to remember something and he freezes before suddenly jolting back.

Something a little like disappointment settles in Chanyeol’s chest, but he looks down at his left arm anyway. The ugly scar of his Mark stares back at him, and his lips twist into a scowl automatically.

“My Mark.”

“Mark?” Baekhyun’s brows wrinkle slightly, and he tilts in a little to look at the scar, though he doesn’t come as close as he had a moment ago.

“From when I was turned.” Chanyeol had thought it was obvious. Didn’t the hunters know about the Marks? Maybe they didn’t call it that, but surely they knew of its existence. They put down enough feral newborns as it was, there’s no way they could’ve missed them.

“I’ve never seen one so silver. It’s like it’s glowing,” Baekhyun murmurs. He’s close again, having leant forward unconsciously, and his breath brushes distractingly over Chanyeol’s skin, moist and warm.

 _Ah_ , Chanyeol thinks, before he takes a purposeful step back. Baekhyun startles slightly, as if he hadn’t realized how close they really were, and he mimics Chanyeol’s movements. The soft blush of pink is blooming again across Baekhyun’s cheeks, and for one second, Chanyeol aches and wishes he were allowed to touch, to feel the heat of Baekhyun’s blood rushing under his thin, delicate skin.

But no, Baekhyun wouldn’t let him, and he can’t let Baekhyun get close either. How is Chanyeol supposed to tell him, after all, that the reason his Mark is so silver is because he’s turned vampires himself, when the hunter society has so condemned the act of turning?

At the beginning, newborn Marks are blood red, angry and festering with bloodlust and thirst. As the vampire matures, the Marks fade to a bone white. Only those who have turned others have Marks that glow quicksilver like the light of the moon. Since very few mature vampires ever cause enough chaos to warrant being hunted down, Baekhyun would have most likely only ever seen the raw, livid Marks present on newborns.

He can’t say it, any of it, to Baekhyun, but to his faint surprise, he finds that he wants to.

But the moment is already broken between them, and Baekhyun won’t meet his eyes. “I—I have to go. Sorry. I’ll let Junmyeon know you answered the door, he’ll be happy to hear that.”

“Oh, okay.” There’s another stilted pause, and Chanyeol adds again, “Thanks for the blood.”

Baekhyun nods, flicks his eyes up to Chanyeol’s for one brief second, before he squares his shoulders and marches down the hall. He doesn’t look back.

Chanyeol stares at Baekhyun’s silhouette vanish around the corner, before he sighs and re-enters his room, ripping open the bag of blood.

To his delight, the blood is type O. There’s a subtle difference between the four main blood types, and over the years Chanyeol has found that he’s come to prefer O. Maybe it’s because of its universal attribute or something else, but to him, it just tastes a little sweeter, a little richer.

After finishing the bag, he considerately brushes his teeth (for the sake of the humans, of course) and changes into another oversized, baggy sweater and matching shorts. He’s feeling pretty good right now – he’s still not operating at full power, but with two bags of blood in him and two full days of sleep, he’s pretty sure that he can run on this for at least a week before recharging.

Best of all, he had even remembered to bring his favorite snapback before running off to the airport in LA.

Smiling, Chanyeol tugs on the hat before heading out to look for Junmyeon.

It’s going to be a good day.

 

 

It’s not a good day.

“What the fuck, Park Chanyeol?” Sehun’s voice whines in his ear the way it does whenever Chanyeol won’t show him the latest mixtape he’s working on. They both know how much it grates on Chanyeol’s nerves, so Sehun only ever does it when he really wants to piss him off. Like now. “How could you just _leave_ me?”

“You’re not a baby,” Chanyeol snaps into the cheap mobile phone Junmyeon had lent him. “It’s not like I haven’t left you alone before. Also who said you could drop the honorific?”

He knows what Sehun’s going to say before he says it, because it’s his favorite go-to insult. To be fair, Chanyeol also set himself up for it this time, though it doesn’t make it any less annoying.

“If we’re going to talk about age, shouldn’t I be calling you old man?” He can practically hear Sehun’s smirk through the phone. “Chanyeol... _hyung_.”

“Let me talk to Jongin,” Chanyeol sighs, kneading one of his hands against his forehead. He’s back in his room, lying on his bed, since he hadn’t known where else to go for privacy. The snapback lies discarded next to him.

The day had started well enough. He had found Junmyeon in his office, as usual, and Junmyeon had been understanding when he’d told him about how he’d taken the past two days off to sleep. He’d asked Chanyeol again if he was _absolutely sure_ he wanted to stay here, to which Chanyeol had scoffed and waved his hand. After that, Junmyeon had thoughtfully offered him the phone, and Chanyeol had retreated to his room to call Sehun with some well-deserved reluctance.

“I’m not done talking to you—” Sehun’s voice is cut off abruptly, only to be replaced by Jongin’s familiar rich timbre.

“Hyung,” he greets Chanyeol. “I heard you wanted to speak with me.”

 _“Screw him, I don’t care about him anyway,”_ Chanyeol hears Sehun shout faintly in the background before the sound of a door slamming ricochets down the call.

Chanyeol smiles a little remorsefully. “I pissed him off, didn’t I?”

“He was only worried about you. We both were.”

“Well, I’m fine, aren’t I? Besides, Sehun would know if I died.” All vampires knew the moment their mentors passed away, after all. That’s how he knew that she was still alive.

Jongin huffs a little. “That doesn’t make it any easier for him. You could’ve been taken by hunters, or even worse, kidnapped back to Korea by those awful traditionalists. You’re not being held hostage, are you? If you are, I can totally ask Minseok-hyung to get in touch with his contacts—”

“No, no, stop,” Chanyeol says hurriedly. “I’m fine. I just felt like... taking a vacation.”

“In Seoul?” Jongin’s voice is full of doubt.

“I missed it.” It’s a half-truth, in any case. Before Jongin can press any further, Chanyeol says, “Also... I might need a favor. Remember those IDs we had when we left Korea?”

Ten minutes later, he hangs up with a long exhale. He had just barely persuaded Jongin out of flying out from LA the very next day with his ID under the premise that ‘of course he doesn’t need it right now,’ tactfully forgetting to mention that he’s already been caught once. He had also avoided the option of express shipping by lying and saying that he was still searching for somewhere to stay more permanently and so had no mailing address. In any case, it isn’t a straight lie – he doesn’t _really_ need his ID soon, and he isn’t planning on staying at the hunter division longer than necessary. He just needs a few weeks to investigate Kyungsoo’s note, that’s all.

That’s all.

Chanyeol thinks of Baekhyun’s delicate, paper-thin skin, thinks of how easy it would be to just crash through the fortress surrounding his mind and make him want Chanyeol, make him crave for his touch just like how he’s always craving for Baekhyun’s.

It’s the poisoned apple, the spindle, the dying rose wilting petal by petal. The more he can’t have it, the more he wants it.

 _But no_ , he sighs, as his fingers clench around the cheap plastic of the temporary phone. This is something he can’t have. Baekhyun is someone he can’t have, at least not that way, or it won’t make him any better than the ones he ran away to escape from all those years ago.

So, yes, he tells himself. He’s here to investigate Kyungsoo’s note, for a few weeks only. Then he’ll receive his ID and suffer through another twelve hour plane ride to Los Angeles, hopefully without the annoying woman in the window seat and the crying baby and his burning, burning thirst. He’ll go home, lose himself in his music, and in a few decades, he’ll forget he ever met someone named Byun Baekhyun here in Seoul. Life will go on. Time will erase all.

Of course, it doesn’t quite happen like that.

 

 

By the time Chanyeol emerges from his room for the second time that day, it’s already dark outside.

The base is quiet, most likely because the majority of hunters are busy patrolling or responding to emergency calls at night. It’s harder to distinguish when he’s awake which of the flickering mass of life signatures omnipresent around him belong to those in this building. At least when he’s sleeping, his attention expands so he can remain vigilant of any possible threats, but when he’s awake, they all merge back together into one vibrant neon glow.

Humanity: a constant fluctuation of energy, of life, powered by their small hearts, like the bass that thuds through his favorite songs.

The itch to create is running through him again in snatches of melodies and threads of lyrics, twisting nebulously in his head, desperate to become something tangible. He usually doesn’t stay this long away from his studio but given the fact that all his equipment – aside from his laptop and headphones – is back in LA, he has little choice.

Chanyeol wanders, heading down to some of the lower floors where he hasn’t yet had a chance to explore, humming one of the stray melodies. They’re almost all locked, empty offices and conference rooms. He’s mostly just trying random doors at this point when suddenly, on the second floor, one of the handles gives way.

Chanyeol pushes open the door curiously. The light flickers on automatically – the blessings of motion sensor lighting – to reveal a small, white-walled room, with a gorgeous, glossy black grand piano sitting in the center.

He lets out a low whistle, walking in and letting the door click shut behind him. “You’re beautiful,” he murmurs, running a hand along the polished surface. His fingers come away free of dust, which means someone must come in often enough to either clean or maintain it. He lifts the lid and tests a key, nodding when it sings back through the air, clear and in tune.

Perfect.

Chanyeol pulls the bench back and sits. He has to adjust it for his height or risk getting his legs trapped between the piano and the bench, since whoever had played it previously was apparently much shorter. Finally, he rests his hands on the keyboard for a second, closes his eyes, and listens to the jumble of melodies in his head until they quiet restlessly and one stands out, like a golden strand, jumping and jubilant.

And he plays.

He plays and plays, as that golden thread shifts into one that’s moonlight silver and dances over the keys, into one that’s melancholy blue and drifts slow like the river, into one that’s passion red and sings of a yearning, a desire, a _lust_ —

There’s a faint click. Chanyeol doesn’t jump, but his eyes snap open, and he shifts keys and rhythms into one that’s slower, more neutral, a calm green.

It says something that he hadn’t even heard Baekhyun come in, only the sound of the door closing.

“Oh, you noticed,” Baekhyun says when he sees Chanyeol open his eyes. He’s standing by the door, arms crossed, dressed in loose black pajamas. “I thought I was being quiet.”

“You were,” Chanyeol answers, but he doesn’t say anything else. He finishes the refrain with a nice, neat little series of arpeggios and a fancy trill of notes to tie it off before placing his hands in his lap. He’s breathing again, he notices, and he’s not sure when he’d started, but the room smells like wood and dust and unmistakably Baekhyun. It’s not just the fresh scent that had wafted in with his entrance, but it’s the layers underneath, painted over where Chanyeol is sitting right now. No wonder the bench had been adjusted so high, he thinks, and holds back a laugh.

Baekhyun walks closer until he’s leaning on the edge of the piano. He rests his right elbow on the wood and lets his palm cradle his cheek, slouching so naturally against the body of the piano that it seems to hug him more than support him. “But you still heard me.”

“There’s not a lot that I don’t hear.” Chanyeol raises an eyebrow.

“There’s not a lot that hear me,” Baekhyun counters.

They lock eyes for a long moment, before Chanyeol cracks and lets a smile slip. “Would you like to sit?” He gestures at the bench.

Baekhyun doesn’t immediately answer, and Chanyeol remembers, with a slightly bitter pang, his aversion to touch. He’s about to offer to move completely when unexpectedly, something flickers through Baekhyun’s eyes and he straightens out of his slouch. “Sure. Move over.”

Chanyeol scrambles to the side, so he’s on the lower range side of the piano, and Baekhyun slides in next to him. Luckily the bench is wide enough that it accommodates both of them easily, and although there’s still a small amount of space between them, Chanyeol is acutely aware that this is the closest they’ve ever been.

If Baekhyun is uncomfortable, he doesn’t show it. He merely places his hands on the keys, cocks an eyebrow at Chanyeol, and smirks in a way that does something absolutely illegal to Chanyeol’s non-beating heart. “Think you can keep up?”

Without waiting for an answer, he jumps straight into a riff of notes, fingers flying over the keys. For a second, Chanyeol is nothing but mesmerized, and he can’t help but think, _here – here is someone whose fingers are made for the piano_. But then his competitive spirit kicks back in as he registers Baekhyun’s words, and he slides in on the next beat, hammering out a steady but still optimistic accompaniment to Baekhyun’s lively melody.

To Chanyeol’s surprise, Baekhyun is better than he is – although, perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised at all. He’s only been playing for ten years, after all, and it still isn’t his instrument of choice; he much prefers the simplicity of the guitar or the stableness of the drums when it comes to making music. The piano is nice in its versatility, but even with the freedom of two hands’ worth of melodies, it had felt somewhat lacking, especially on its own without the beat of a bass drum to spice it up. But with Baekhyun – with Baekhyun, it feels... right. Whole. As if this is how it was made to sound all along, with four hands instead of two.

They run through classics and jazzy solos and swap between American and Korean pop when it becomes clear that Chanyeol isn’t very familiar with most of the latest Korean pop songs. Baekhyun sometimes lets him steal the melody for a few moments, before he takes over again with an ease that seems to come as natural as breathing. Chanyeol glances over once, but Baekhyun’s eyes are closed, and he looks so utterly relaxed that Chanyeol has to look away before it feels like he’s intruding on something private.

They’re toeing the line between a song that’s slow and soft, all white keys and long rolling chords, when suddenly, Baekhyun launches into something that’s both upbeat and liquid melody all at once. Chanyeol complies accordingly, shifting keys and following the catchy syncopation of the rhythm. He’s just getting into the new song when Baekhyun opens his mouth and starts singing next to him, and for the first time, Chanyeol’s hands stutter and he misses one note, two, three, before he just gives up and stares in shock with his mouth open.

Because _damn,_ can Baekhyun sing.

 _“Tonight, looking at the melancholy moon, you’re also as lonely as me, living with an empty heart.”_ His voice is honey and warmth, unlike anything Chanyeol has ever heard before, and he doesn’t have to look at Baekhyun’s face to hear the smile in his voice. This is the voice of someone genuinely happy, someone who sincerely loves this, the music, as much as Chanyeol does. Baekhyun plays the short melody again, before finishing, _“You’re also as lonely as me, living with an empty heart.”_

He finishes on a chord, and the sound lingers through the air for a moment before Baekhyun lifts his hands from the piano and opens his eyes. His eyes are clear and so wonderfully open when they meet Chanyeol’s, and they take the air he doesn’t need away with the force of them.

“Well, I think I won,” Baekhyun announces, and he laughs.

Chanyeol blinks, still in some shock, and he blurts without thinking, “Why are you a hunter? You—shouldn’t you be singing?” Instantly, he regrets it, as Baekhyun’s face closes off. Trying to fix his mistake, he blunders, “You just sing so well—”

“I can’t.” Baekhyun looks away from him, back at the piano, and runs one of his pale hands along the slick white of the keys.

“You can’t sing?” Chanyeol tilts his head in confusion, thinking back to the voice of molten gold that he had just heard.

Baekhyun sighs once, and his shoulders seem to hunch in on himself. His hand slams down on the piano keys, and the discordant sound screeches through the air. Chanyeol winces. “I can’t sing in front of other people.”

“But... you just sang in front of me.”

Baekhyun’s hand eases of the keys, and he’s silent for a long second, before he says softly, “Yes, I guess I did.”

“Well, I suppose I’m not a person, exactly, so it doesn’t matter,” Chanyeol jokes, desperate to get the previous atmosphere back. Baekhyun stiffens, almost imperceptibly, next to him, and Chanyeol quickly decides that he should just shut his mouth. He slumps on the bench, staring at his hands in his lap, as the silence hangs awkward and heavy over them.

He’s about to just stand up and leave him be when abruptly, Baekhyun says, “I didn’t expect you to know how to play piano.”

Chanyeol is more than happy to accommodate the switch in topic. “I started after I went to America. It helps with some of the music I made.”

“You make music?” Baekhyun perks up, and he looks at Chanyeol again, though his eyes are a little more shuttered now. “Hopefully it’s better than your piano-playing.”

“Hey,” Chanyeol protests, “we can’t all be piano prodigies. I’m very good at the guitar, I’ll have you know.”

“So is that what you were doing in your room for the past two days?” Baekhyun looks down back at the piano and pokes at a key. “Just wondering. You didn’t come to the roof either.”

Chanyeol stands and moves to the side of the piano, stretching slightly. His fingers feel a little more sore than he would’ve expected, so they must’ve been playing for a while now. “Oh, no, I don’t have my keyboard or my guitar, so I can’t really make anything right now. I was sleeping.”

There’s another discordant crash, and Chanyeol jumps and looks behind him. Baekhyun is staring at him with wide eyes and an unrecognizable expression on his face. Did he say something weird? Chanyeol runs back over the conversation in his head, but he can’t think of anything out of the ordinary.

Thankfully, Baekhyun answers his unspoken question for him. “You were sleeping?” he asks, slowly, as if he thinks Chanyeol had mispronounced something. “Are you—half?”

Ah, Chanyeol thinks, and there’s another twinge of that odd bitterness. He smiles a little with the corner of his mouth, and he knows the expression doesn’t reach his eyes. “No, sorry to crush your hopes. We call it sleep, but it’s probably closer to what you humans consider meditation. We’re not truly unconscious, nor do we dream.”

There’s something he’s starting to realize, the closer he gets to Baekhyun ( _the poisoned apple, the spindle, the dying rose wilting petal by petal_ ) – and that is, no matter how close he gets, no matter how many songs they share, there will still be something unbridgeable, that one inch gap of space that cannot be closed. Something indefinitely unreachable, placed tantalizingly within view but out of range, because of the undeniable nature of who – of what – they are.

Vampire, and human.

Hunter, and prey.

“Oh,” Baekhyun says softly, before he repeats, louder, “Oh.” And then he’s standing too, as the bench slides back across the wooden panels of the floor with a loud screech. “Wait, I didn’t mean it like that. I just—I didn’t know your kind could even sleep for shorter amounts of time than the hibernations.”

“Deep sleep,” Chanyeol corrects automatically, before Baekhyun’s words register. He frowns. He didn’t know? But Junmyeon had. Was it only Junmyeon? Just how out of touch is the hunter division? Do they have no spies among the vampires? Sure, a great majority of them – Chanyeol sometimes included, but only when necessary, and not so much anymore – tend to be secretive, lying bastards on a good day, but surely no matter how underfunded or new the hunter division of Korea is, it couldn’t be this deficient?

Then again, he thinks back to how hard the traditionalist vampires he knew used to fight tooth and nail to prevent any vampire from falling into the hands of the old hunters, even at the sake of eliminating their own kind, and he thinks again, maybe not.

A little bit embarrassed at how overdramatic he had been a second ago, Chanyeol leans against the piano, though nowhere near as gracefully as Baekhyun had earlier. “We can sleep. It’s more to recharge than anything, and it’s a substitute for drinking, though less effective. Not many sleep lightly, only the older vampires.”

“Older vampires?” Baekhyun’s brows furrow, and something like suspicion darts through his eyes.

 _Oh shit_ , Chanyeol despairs in his head. So much for keeping things from Baekhyun. Hurriedly, he blurts out the first thing he can think of. “It’s also the closest I can get to dreaming.”

Well, the implication of it is a half-truth, anyway.

Nonetheless, Baekhyun takes the bait, and his eyes soften again. He walks to the other side of the piano and mirrors Chanyeol’s position, though with much more success. “I’ve always thought that the nights must be terribly long as a vampire, without dreams to fill the space.”

“I fill it with music instead,” Chanyeol answers, this time completely truthfully. Once, he too had thought of the nights as eternal, too long and too short all at once, before he grew strong enough to withstand the sun. But that is ancient history, and now, it all passes the same. “I don’t sleep often, only when I want to offset the thirst.”

“Hm.” Baekhyun is lost in thought for a moment, and his fingers swirl in lazy patterns across the surface of the piano. Finally, he sighs, and pulls himself upright. “Speaking of which, it’s probably time I go to bed as well.”

Chanyeol consults his inner clock and frowns. “It’s late.”

“Sometimes I can’t sleep very well, so I come here to play,” Baekhyun says lightly, flipping on his heel and heading towards the door. “Though you may not have dreams, at least be thankful that you don’t have nightmares anymore either.”

Chanyeol tests the waters, a little tauntingly. “Should I not come here anymore, then? I didn’t know it was your piano.”

Baekhyun reaches the door, and sends a look back over his shoulder. “I didn’t say that. You could definitely use the practice.”

“Hey,” Chanyeol protests, but Baekhyun is already pulling open the door, flashing one final smile back.

“Be honored, I don’t allow just anybody into this room you know,” he calls over his shoulder as he steps outside.

The door is almost closed when Chanyeol says, “Baekhyun, wait.” The door stops, and Chanyeol takes in a deep breath ( _wood, dust, Baekhyun_ ) before he exhales, long and slow. “Thank you, for tonight.”

_For letting me hear you sing, when nobody else could. For letting me sit next to you and play piano with you. For letting me share something I love with someone—_

There’s a pause, and then a soft, “Good night, Park Chanyeol.”

The door clicks shut.

Chanyeol sits back down at the piano, runs a hand over the lingering warmth left in the right half of the bench, and hovers over the keys before letting the music sing free. He thinks of Baekhyun, built of upbeats and liquid melody like his last song, and for once, the piano doesn’t feel quite as lonely anymore.

 

 

The next few days merge together into a seamless flow of warm sunshine and slow breezes, of music and conversation.

The next time Chanyeol goes to the roof, he arrives before Baekhyun. Truthfully, he’s not even sure if Baekhyun is going to show up – he had seen no trace of the other all day, after their shared piano moment, and the strangest sensations had been buzzing nervously through him as the day wore on. Anxiety, fear, disappointment, mingling somewhere deep inside him until his feet brought him back to the roof before he even realized it.

The sun is half gone, a round golden-orange crescent on the horizon, when the door slams open from behind him. Chanyeol turns and sees Baekhyun panting, one hand braced on his knee, silver hair flung around his face as if he had sprinted up all those stairs in an effort to make it before the sun finished setting. Or maybe that’s just Chanyeol’s wishful thinking. Regardless, the tangled knot of emotions in his chest eases, and he smiles so hard he feels the edges of it crease into his cheeks.

“You’re here,” Baekhyun gasps, still hunched over, taking the words right out of Chanyeol’s mouth.

“That’s what I’m supposed to say,” Chanyeol returns wryly, shuffling a little at his spot next to the railing. He’s not sure if he should go over and offer assistance – as if he can give any assistance anyway – but Baekhyun finally catches his breath and staggers over before collapsing in a small heap on the floor. Feeling suddenly too tall, Chanyeol mimics him, though much more awkwardly, and he curses his long limbs and height silently in his head.

Down here, the breeze is blocked slightly, and the sun’s dying light reaches them in thin stripes between the gaps of the iron railing.

“I didn’t think you would come,” Baekhyun admits a few minutes later between the incessant honking of the traffic below and the cries of birds just beginning their migration for the fall. The weather is still unseasonably warm outside, but Chanyeol isn’t complaining.

 _Me too_ , he wants to say, _I didn’t know if something had changed between us last night. I didn’t know if you wanted to see me again._

But instead, he says, “I remember you said I hadn’t come to the roof during those two days. So I thought maybe you missed me.” He grins cheekily, slanting a glance at Baekhyun’s sun-kissed face from the corner of his eyes.

“As if,” Baekhyun snorts, curling his arms around his legs, drawn up to his chest. He steadfastly refuses to look at Chanyeol when he mumbles, “I didn’t say that.”

“Mhm,” Chanyeol hums, smiling slightly, as the sun dips below the horizon and the sky fades to a lovely azure blue around them.

During the sunset, they’re separated from the rest of the world, but they’re not alone. The rest of the hunters eat inside the building, and the city of Seoul crawls along at their feet.

But at night, it’s as if only the two of them exist. Not Chanyeol the vampire or Baekhyun the hunter, but just Chanyeol and Baekhyun, two souls in love with their music and their craft. Their own little universe, wrapped in pristine white walls, orbiting around that beautiful black piano.

At first, Chanyeol is afraid that Baekhyun is going to withdraw again, afraid that he’ll never hear that voice of molten gold one more time. But Baekhyun sits down the next night and launches into a slow ballad without hesitation, as if something has been unlocked from deep inside him and now comes pouring out, waves and swelling waves of breathtaking emotion. Chanyeol says nothing, only keeping beat with his albeit average accompaniment skills, and Baekhyun sings.

Unfortunately, Baekhyun is still human, and so therefore is still bound by the petty limitations of the human body and time. For the first time in a very long time, Chanyeol finds himself bored during the day. There’s only so much he can do with the piano without Baekhyun, and without his studio or his coven to occupy his time, he finds himself lurking around the building or pestering Junmyeon, counting down the hours until the sunset. The only good thing that comes out of it are the bits of information he picks up from overheard conversations or reports.

Even then, he feels that he should probably be more concerned, but all of a sudden, he can’t really find the energy to bother with investigations and hunting. He hears rumors of increasing feral vampires spotted or stealing from blood banks, but it’s nothing big enough to warrant suspicion, not from Chanyeol or from the majority of the hunter ranks. Still, in response to the potential threat, Junmyeon assigns more night patrols, and unfortunately, Baekhyun is part of that.

Chanyeol sighs, cheek pressed against the wooden lid of the piano as he slumps against it. It’s been two days now since Baekhyun was last in the room. The last time he was in here, he had been so exhausted that he’d fallen asleep in the middle of one of Chanyeol’s jam sessions. He had looked over when there had been no response to his question – _‘do you think I should just switch keys entirely’_ – and had seen Baekhyun curled on the floor, leaning against the side of the bench, eyelashes fanning softly across his cheeks.

That strange sense of déjà vu had swept over him again, familiar and taunting, and Chanyeol had frowned but couldn’t place it. Then that too had been brushed away by the incredible urge to touch. Baekhyun had been _right there_ , the nape of his neck exposed as his head tilted forward, and he wouldn’t have known if Chanyeol was careful enough—

After that, Chanyeol had very determinedly looked away and started playing again on the piano, the kind of rigid, tasteless march he had come to learn Baekhyun hated, and sure enough, Baekhyun woke up a second later with a splutter.

He doesn’t think that alone was enough to warrant a temper tantrum, but for two days, he pretty much only sees Baekhyun in the brief snatches of time when he’s running out during the day or coming back at night to sleep. Maybe he’s just overthinking it. Or maybe Baekhyun is actually mad at him for some reason or another. Should he apologize? But for what?

Chanyeol wonders if this is infatuation, if he’s acting the same way Sehun had when he had first seen Jongin dance in that seedy nightclub in downtown Seoul.

All he knows is that he’s never felt this frustrated, this confused, this desperate to see someone. Time is always slow to his kind, and usually not very sympathetic, but now, it seems to drag on longer than ever.

Somewhere, deep inside of him, for the first time in many years, Chanyeol finds himself wishing he were human again.

He sighs and closes his eyes, counting down the seconds until dawn, until Baekhyun.

 

 

The next day, there’s a knock on his bedroom door.

Chanyeol’s eyes fly open, and he lowers the headphones so that they loop heavily around his neck. There’s another series of knocks, and Chanyeol shouts a “coming!” before swinging off his bed and opening the door.

Just like that time a week ago after he had first slept, Baekhyun is standing there, an unreadable expression on his face, decked in his hunting attire, leather gloves and all. Chanyeol blinks for a moment, and thinks that he’s hallucinating for one wild instant, since it’s the middle of the day when he never sees Baekhyun, and on top of that, he hasn’t seen him for three days now. But then Baekhyun shifts his weight and bites his lip, and a very real flush of red skims the tips of his ears, tantalizing and warm, when Chanyeol continues to stare.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hey,” Chanyeol returns, an eyebrow raised. “It’s been a while.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.” Baekhyun grimaces a bit, running a hand through his hair. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the hunter division has been kind of overworked recently. Influx of ferals for some odd reason. Not too big of a problem though.”

Chanyeol pretends to put on a hard front, crossing his arms and frowning. “You were so busy you couldn’t even make it to your sunsets?” He’s not really upset – okay, well, a tiny bit, which he knows is unfair – but it’s worth it to see the way Baekhyun’s eyes widen.

“I just told you I was busy,” he complains, bottom lip sticking out in an adorable pout. “You’re... you’re not really mad, are you?” And then he makes actual puppy eyes at him, and Chanyeol can’t keep up the front anymore.

He laughs first, but Baekhyun follows soon after, and it’s Chanyeol’s favorite kind of laugh – the one where it crinkles his nose and scrunches his eyes until all he can see is Baekhyun’s pure, unadulterated joy. (How one person can be so gorgeous, Chanyeol has tried to figure out many times and still doesn’t know.)

“I have a confession,” Baekhyun says solemnly after his laughter dies down, though the mirth still glimmers in his eyes. “I wasn’t busy with just the hunting.”

Chanyeol makes a noise of mock shock and places a hand over his chest. “I’m wounded. Keeping secrets now, Byun Baekhyun?”

The irony of that question doesn’t escape him, but he ignores it.

“How about I make it up to you?”

Baekhyun reaches forward and slips his hand into Chanyeol’s. For one long second, Chanyeol freezes, and if he still had a beating heart, he’s sure it would’ve just crashed through his chest by now and smashed itself on the floor.

Then Baekhyun tugs, looking back when he doesn’t feel Chanyeol move with him, and Chanyeol finally recognizes the smooth, buttery sensation of leather against his palm, not the soft, pliable warmth of human skin.

“What’s wrong?” Baekhyun asks, tilting his head slightly.

Still, it takes a moment for Chanyeol’s brain to kick-start again, and he has to swallow around the irrational lump of disappointment in his throat before he can speak. “Nothing. So, just how exactly are you going to make it up to me?” _Stupid, stupid_ , he berates himself, _for expecting things from Baekhyun that you know by now he can’t give._

“You’ll see!” Cheerfully ignorant of the mess currently clamoring inside Chanyeol’s head, Baekhyun starts walking again, and this time, Chanyeol follows. Baekhyun leads them down to the second floor, and for a moment, he thinks they’re going to the piano room, but Baekhyun walks past it without stopping. They’re almost at the end of the hallway when they finally stop in front of a similarly nondescript door, except it looks newer than the other ones, as if it was recently refitted.

“Well, go on,” Baekhyun says, still smiling, but there’s a trace of something like nervousness in his voice. He pulls his hand free from Chanyeol’s and gestures at the door.

It’s unexpectedly heavy when Chanyeol pushes it open, and also unexpectedly familiar in its weight. It’s clearly a door meant for a soundproofed room, like the ones outfitted in his studio back home, and he’s a little confused about why such a room would exist on this floor for only a moment before the lights flicker on and his mouth drops.

It’s a studio.

Not _his_ studio – there’s a distinct lack of his One Piece flag and additional anime paraphernalia for that – but it’s _a_ studio, and a pretty well-created one at that. There’s an electronic keyboard resting on a long table and a guitar settled in the corner, and there’s even a set of wide desktop monitors with a cable to connect his laptop.

“It’s soundproofed, I checked, and I didn’t know what kind of microphones you liked so I just ordered a bunch, if you don’t like them you can just return them, I have the receipts around here somewhere,” Baekhyun is rattling on from behind him a mile a minute, and he talks even faster when Chanyeol doesn’t respond. “Do you like it? I know it’s probably not that great, I don’t know anything about making music or putting together a studio, so if you hate it I completely understand, I just—”

“I love it,” Chanyeol finally cuts in, whirling around on his feet. He’s smiling and smiling and he doesn’t think he can ever stop smiling again, and why would he want to in front of this beautiful, beautiful human being named Byun Baekhyun? He made a whole _studio_ for Chanyeol, and if that isn’t a ticket straight to his heart, he doesn’t know what else could be.

Baekhyun stops, eyes wide, fingers playing with his leather gloves. “Really? You’re not just saying that because I’m here, are you?”

“No, I’m one hundred percent serious.” Chanyeol spins, flicking on the keyboard and testing out some of the sounds. “This is amazing. Where did you get the money for all of this?”

“Junmyeon. He was more than accommodating. I think he was also pretty glad I was spending my time doing something else other than hunting for once,” Baekhyun laughs a little sheepishly. “I remember you said you missed your studio, and you seemed kind of bored just in the piano room, so...”

“I wasn’t bored because of you,” Chanyeol hurries to add, and looks over just in time to see something in Baekhyun’s eyes soften.

Baekhyun snorts and steps forward to stand side by side with Chanyeol, ducking his head so his expression is hidden. He clears his throat before saying, “Well, I would sure hope not. Otherwise I’m taking this studio for myself and you can have the piano room forever.”

“You would hate it more than me, I bet,” Chanyeol teases. “Besides, we can just buy another keyboard, and you can play with me in here. It’ll be no grand piano, but still, we could record something, you know?”

The thought of making something with Baekhyun – something that has the potential to last forever, even beyond their own lifespans – sends a shock of thrilling happiness from his chest to his toes. He doesn’t remember the last time he’s felt this happy, this content, this grateful, and melodies spark inside his head with the birth of a thousand possibilities.

Baekhyun smiles a bit, just the corners of his lips, and he mumbles, “Yeah, that’d be nice.” He looks down at the keyboard slightly pensively, tapping a key. “Play something?”

Chanyeol usually doesn’t make a habit of replaying songs he’s already released, but – narcissistic or not – he’s missed his own music a bit recently, so he adjusts the volume on the keyboard and settles his fingers on the familiar chords. It’s a little awkward, and he has to adjust some of the notes meant for the guitar to the piano, but the basic melody is still there.

Although he had been the main producer of the song, it had originally been a duet with a female singer from Korea, their parts recorded separately overseas for some drama or other. She had come in first after a couple measures, but Chanyeol knows his limits – including his vocal range – so he doesn’t try to sing. But to his surprise, Baekhyun does.

_“Every time I close my eyes, oh I always see those eyes. Tell me what I can do to forget, all the pain since we first met.”_

The words fall, familiar, from Baekhyun’s lips, and it’s clear this is a song he knows by his heart. (And maybe he’s a little biased, but Chanyeol thinks it sounds better than the original.) Something strange wells up in Chanyeol’s throat, and he stops playing. “You know this song?”

“Who doesn’t? I know you haven’t been in Korea for a while, but seriously, _Stay with Me_ was the number one hit last year. I’m more surprised that you know it, to be honest.” Baekhyun takes over the keyboard and continues where Chanyeol had left off. “Oh, here’s where LOEY comes in.”

Chanyeol can’t help but startle a little when he hears his stage name. Sure, he had known that _Stay with Me_ had been popular – his bank account had certainly fattened quite a bit – but he hadn’t really cared enough to check the charts. There’s something so surreal about the situation that he wants to laugh and cry at the same time. “Do... do you like LOEY?”

“Like LOEY?” Baekhyun looks insulted for some unfathomable reason, and he jabs a finger at Chanyeol’s chest, a pinprick of heat against the thin fabric of his shirt. “I _love_ LOEY. He’s like – a musical god. You see that kind of talent maybe once every hundred years.”

If Chanyeol had the blood within him to blush, he’s sure his whole face would be bright red. Thankfully, he keeps his composure with a stifled cough, though he can’t meet Baekhyun’s eyes. “I don’t know about that,” he mutters, and when Baekhyun makes a stifled noise next to him in protest, Chanyeol quickly changes the subject. “What about this song, then?”

It’s an American song, so it most likely wouldn’t have hit Korean charts. It had been another collaboration with a popular American group, and his only part had really been a rap solo in the middle. The electronic sounds are much heavier in this song, so he flicks to one of the preset modes that mimics the mood of the song averagely enough. He’s only played a few measures of the chorus when Baekhyun starts singing along.

_“I’m all yours when you really wanna take me there, don’t let me go nowhere. I’d give it all up for you, I swear, only for real love.”_

It’s the same slightly accented English Chanyeol remembers from the first day they met at the airport, but it’s still kind of adorable, and he hides a smile.

“ _Freal Luv_ is amazing, but LOEY’s rap is what really takes it to the next level, you know. I bet this was playing everywhere in America, wasn’t it, when it came out a few years ago?”

Chanyeol thinks back, and vaguely remembers Sehun complaining that he’d had enough of hearing Chanyeol’s voice everywhere on the radio and thereafter never turning on the radio again for the rest of the year. “I guess,” he concedes. “I wouldn’t have expected you to like this kind of song.”

“Why, you think I only like slow classical piano pieces?” Baekhyun frowns.

“No, I think you only like mainstream pop songs,” Chanyeol teases. “ _Gee gee gee gee_ —”

Baekhyun’s frown deepens into a scowl. “Excuse me, Girls’ Generation is _legendary_ , not just mainstream pop. But I guess you’re right, I usually don’t listen to this kind of music. It’s just LOEY. I feel like I could listen to anything he produces and still fall in love.”

There it is again, that word. It hits him like a brick and echoes around his mind a few times before he firmly shakes his head. No, Baekhyun likes LOEY, not him. His music, not him, but truthfully, the line is thin enough that part of Chanyeol’s mind doesn’t really understand the difference. “Really? So you know all of his songs, then.”

“Test me and find out,” Baekhyun says, lifting his head tauntingly.

Chanyeol picks a song from his SoundCloud – not his official account, but a smaller subaccount that only the most dedicated followers knew of. It’s where he tends to post unfinished songs or snippets of his next project or just whatever came to mind that day while composing. He sets it back to the piano mode and starts with a series of gently rolling chords. It’s a little empty without the drums and cymbals in the back to serve as an accompaniment, but clearly, Baekhyun doesn’t need it to recognize the song.

_“Girl, perhaps you’re trying to hide, yeah. Your wings and many charms that I don’t know of, hiding behind your small shoulders.”_

Chanyeol raises an eyebrow, impressed, and skips the rap portion in order to jump to the chorus. Baekhyun doesn’t miss a beat, switching lyrics with ease.

_“When I open or close my eyes, I always think of you, babe. There’s nothing as beautiful as you anywhere. You are—”_

_“I just want to tell you today,”_ Chanyeol fills in the spoken line, and Baekhyun concedes it gracefully before singing again.

_“You are—”_

_“I want to walk in front with you.”_

_“You are—”_

_“Even if I try to pretend.”_

_“Actually I only think of you, you are.”_

The last note lingers in the air before finally dissipating as Chanyeol takes his hands off the keyboard. He doesn’t know what to say, and can only look at Baekhyun with something like awe and disbelief.

“What, why are you looking at me like that?”

“You actually like these songs? For real?” Chanyeol asks.

Baekhyun’s eyebrows knit together, and he crosses his arms in front of his chest. “Clearly you also know LOEY’s music well enough to play songs like _You Are_. Should you really be asking me that? What about you? Why don’t you like him?”

Chanyeol can’t help but laugh. Baekhyun stares at him a little like he’s lost his mind, and maybe Chanyeol has. It’s not that he hasn’t met fans before – he has, in the backlit, compressed corners of clubs while DJ-ing and after radio broadcasts – but... this is Baekhyun. Baekhyun, who loves sunsets and plays the piano when he can’t sleep at night, who’s made of harsh broken edges and soft sunshine warmth. Baekhyun, who won’t let Chanyeol touch him but somehow has still gotten closer to him in weeks than anyone else outside of his coven has in years. Baekhyun, who loves Korean pop songs but somehow memorized the lyrics to all of Chanyeol’s music, even the ones so underground that hardly anyone knows about them. Baekhyun, who stands in front of him now, passionately defending his favorite producer from – well, Chanyeol himself.

Something swells in his chest – not the burning, desperate urge to _possesspossesspossess_ from the roof, but something gentler, sweeter. Something that makes him want to cradle Baekhyun’s cheeks with his hands and protect him, forever, from everything else in the world.

“I never said I didn’t like him.” When Baekhyun opens his mouth, clearly ready to fight, Chanyeol shushes him and grips his hand. The heat burns him through the thin leather. “Come on, now it’s my turn to show you something nice.”

Baekhyun balks a little when they return to Chanyeol’s room, but Chanyeol ushers him in with a promise of, “You’ll like it, seriously, but it’s on my laptop so you’re gonna have to come in.”

Vampires don’t have perfect memory; if anything, Chanyeol is (un-)living proof of that. But he knows he’ll never forget the way Baekhyun’s mouth drops and his eyes widen when Chanyeol shows him his library of unpublished songs on his laptop.

“You’re joking,” Baekhyun says, perched on the edge of his bed, frantically scrolling through song after song. “I don’t believe this.”

Chanyeol smirks and takes the laptop back before clicking open one of the files for another song. The program fills his screen, layers and layers of instruments and vocals weaving intricately together into one cohesive track. It’s one that has already been published, and Baekhyun plays the lead vocal clip with shock that quickly melts into something warmer. Then, all of a sudden, he shoves the laptop back into Chanyeol’s lap before flopping backwards onto the bed, covering his face with his gloved hands.

“I’m so embarrassed,” he moans from beneath his palms. “I hate everything. I hate myself. I hate you.”

“You _love_ me,” Chanyeol can’t help but correct, a grin stretching across his face, and he sets the laptop to the side.

“Shut up, I love LOEY,” Baekhyun shouts, rolling over. He flails a little on the bed, kicking the covers, before mumbling, “Who just happens to be you.”

“Hehe. Surprised?”

“I can’t believe this. How did this happen? How? The chances are basically zero.”

That’s a good question, one that Chanyeol wonders at as well, but he’s more grateful than anything for that almost-zero possibility that led to him meeting Baekhyun, here in his lifetime. “Serendipity?” he offers lightly instead.

“That’s just a fancy word for destiny, which is all a crock of shit,” Baekhyun says, and sits up suddenly. His hair is mussed from where he rolled on the bed, and Chanyeol resists the urge to reach over and flatten it back down. He looks at Chanyeol imperiously. “Okay, that’s enough. I’m not forgiving you yet.”

Chanyeol pulls his own puppy face. “Really? Not even for LOEY?”

Baekhyun pretends to consider it for a moment, tapping his finger against his chin, before pointing at the laptop. “Well, I suppose you could show me the songs you haven’t released yet. That might be enough to earn my forgiveness.”

“Oh, thank you, Your Highness, for your benevolence,” Chanyeol says mockingly, and Baekhyun kicks him with one socked foot. “Okay, okay, I’m going.”

He doesn’t mind – doesn’t think he could ever mind – sharing his music with Baekhyun. Not when Baekhyun has given him a chance to find music in a place he never thought he could, in this city where he has only ever had desolation and darkness.

Chanyeol looks at Baekhyun, memorizes the way his eyes close and his shoulders sway when he gets into a song, pink lips mouthing along to the words. And he dreams about telling Baekhyun all of this one day, of holding him down and telling him over and over, sharp edges and all, of how important he has become to Chanyeol, until Baekhyun believes it as much as Chanyeol does.

Of how much he wants him to stay.

 

 

Chanyeol basically lives in his studio after that. It comes to the point where even Junmyeon knows to look for him there if he needs him for something.

The first time he had dropped by, Junmyeon had told him with a knowing look in his eye, “This is the most Baekhyun has ever done for another person, you know.”

“Oh really,” Chanyeol had replied flatly, one ear still pressed tight to his headphones.

“Mhm,” Junmyeon had answered, smirking, and Chanyeol had tried not read too much into it (but it was already much too late for that).

Baekhyun comes by often enough, and though Chanyeol offers to look into purchasing another keyboard, Baekhyun just shakes his head and seems content to sit on the side and watch Chanyeol mess around with his music. It’s a little disconcerting, since he usually doesn’t have company when he makes music, but he finds that he doesn’t really mind. So when Baekhyun drops by early in the morning the next day, Chanyeol isn’t surprised. He raises his head and nods a greeting before turning back to the track he’s currently working on. It’s new, still in its baby steps of creation, but his vision for the song has already long since been solidified.

Baekhyun doesn’t enter the room, just stands at the threshold of the door, dressed in his hunter gear. He clears his throat slightly before saying, “So, I’m going to respond to a call.”

Chanyeol nods again and doesn’t look up, used to the way Baekhyun’s seemingly always on the job during the day. “Stay safe.” When there’s no response, and the door doesn’t close immediately, Chanyeol finally looks up, pausing the part he’s working on. Baekhyun isn’t looking at him, and his hand is rubbing absentmindedly over the hilt of his stake the way he does when he’s nervous about something. “What’s up?”

He’s not sure what he’s expecting, but it’s definitely not for Baekhyun to take a deep breath and say, “Wanna come?”

Chanyeol blinks. “Me?”

“Do you see anyone else in this room?” The words are harsh, but his tone is soft, almost fond. Baekhyun smirks a little, and his hand drops from his stake. “Yes, you, Park Chanyeol.”

“Am I even allowed to leave?”

“I got permission from the Commander.”

“And you’re fine with me leaving?” Chanyeol raises an eyebrow. He still hasn’t quite forgotten Baekhyun’s initial wariness and defensiveness towards him, though by now, he mostly attributes it to an overall lack of knowledge about vampires in general, something that seems to plague most of the hunter division.

Baekhyun’s ears flush, and he looks embarrassed. “I didn’t – I mean. I already apologized for that.”

“I wasn’t accusing you,” he replies mildly, “just asking.”

“I know.” Baekhyun worries his lip for a bit before sighing. “I don’t mind. I trust you.”

That undeserving trust again. Something like guilt races through him, and Chanyeol smiles to disguise it. “Well, then I guess I have no choice, do I?”

It’s with some surprise that he realizes, when they step out to the cool breeze of dawn, that this is the first time he’s been outside in a while now. The sun is warm and sleepy on the horizon, and at this time of the day, not even the office workers and schoolchildren are up and about yet. He’s replenished his blood supply fairly recently, so the daylight hardly affects him at all. One of the black cars is waiting at the front of the building, and Baekhyun slides in the back with a lithe grace that Chanyeol wishes he could imitate. Once they’re both inside, it starts up with barely a rumble and pulls away.

“It’s incredible how much a city can change in ten years,” Chanyeol murmurs distractedly, watching the metal-and-glass skyscrapers and office buildings race by him.

“I know. It looks completely different from how I remember it in my childhood.” There’s a moment of silence, and then Baekhyun asks, “Why did you leave Korea?”

Up till now, they’ve had an unspoken, tacit agreement of privacy – you don’t ask about the skeletons in my closet, and I won’t try to dig up yours. It isn’t that he doesn’t want to answer Baekhyun, it’s that he can’t, or so Chanyeol tells himself. It’s for Baekhyun’s own protection. There are worse things that go bump in the night than Chanyeol, and Baekhyun doesn’t, can’t, know about them. Even so, he doesn’t want to outright lie, so he tells a heavily edited truth. “Same reason why all governments fall apart. Difference in opinions. I no longer agreed with the things that my... the vampires who I used to run with were doing. Well, to be exact, I hadn’t agreed with them for a long time, but I didn’t get fed up enough to leave until ten years ago.” _I hadn’t been brave enough to leave before then. And I’m still not brave enough to face them now._

“It must’ve been lonely in America.” And for a moment, Baekhyun looks small, so different from his usual outspoken, sassy self, that it feels wrong. Chanyeol thinks of what Junmyeon had told him – _he survived, but his parents did not_ – and how achingly alone he must have been. At least Chanyeol has had some kind of coven for as long as he can remember.

“I had Sehun, and Jongin, so it wasn’t too bad.” At Baekhyun’s look of confusion, he elaborates, “My coven.”

“Are you all—related?”

“Ah... not genetically. My kind doesn’t have to be tied by blood to be considered a coven.” It’s a half-truth, anyway. Chanyeol believes it, and lives by it, but the traditionalists had never agreed. It had been one point of many that they had fought over.

Baekhyun nods, seemingly appeased by the answer. “You don’t miss them now?” There’s still that vague look of uncertainty on his face, and Chanyeol doesn’t like it.

“Nah, Sehun’s a little shit most of the time, and all Jongin does is indulge his appetite. The amount of times I tell him to just force Sehun to starve a little.” Chanyeol rolls his eyes. “If I have to spend forever with them, I think I deserve a vacation sometimes, you know?” He would’ve been ripped apart (by Sehun and Jongin both) if they had heard him just now, but the exaggeration is worth it. A smile tugs at Baekhyun’s lips, and his whole face brightens with that small movement. He’s about to say something else when the car rolls to a smooth stop.

“We’re here.” Baekhyun exits from his side, and Chanyeol follows. The car pulls away after he closes the door, and Baekhyun explains, “It’s just going to take a few laps around the block to avoid suspicion. I’ll call it back when we’re done.”

“Sounds good. So... what’re we facing exactly? Blood bag thief? Thirst-frenzy? Feral newborn?” Chanyeol bounces on his toes, a little excited. It feels good to be back outside, away from the stale indoor air. The sun has inched a little higher over the horizon, and the sky peels back layer over layer to reveal a blushing pink staining the edge of the world.

Baekhyun shakes his head. “No. Dead body.” He rechecks the address written on a piece of paper before tucking it in his pocket. “This is it.” He points to a dim alleyway tucked between the sleek design of a modern café and the red-bricked exterior of a restaurant.

“A little unusual for a murder spot,” Chanyeol comments, following Baekhyun as they head into the alley. “And it’s a vampire’s victim for sure?”

“That’s what the caller said.” They edge around a stack of cardboard boxes and venture deeper into the alleyway. It’s fairly clean, which isn’t too surprising, considering the neighborhood they’re in. They’re silent as they walk – Baekhyun out of habit, Chanyeol naturally – and they’re almost at the end of the alleyway with no sign of the body yet.

“You’re sure this is the place right—whoa!” Chanyeol nearly avoids slamming into Baekhyun as the hunter suddenly comes to a stop in front of him. Baekhyun stares at something on the ground in front of them, hidden in the shadow of the dumpster. Chanyeol peers around him to look as well. “What’s wrong? Is that the—oh.”

Oh, indeed.

It’s a body, and it’s dead, no doubt about that. It’s even a vampire’s victim – but it’s not human.

It’s a vampire.

Contrary to popular myths, vampires do not actually turn to dust upon death. Instead, it would be more accurate to say that time took its toll and caught up to them in one agonizing moment. Of course, for some of the older vampires – Chanyeol included – all that might be left of them at the end would basically be dust, but for more recently turned vampires, such as this one, they would end up looking almost virtually the same as any other human corpse.

However, the glaring edges of the red Mark on the side of the vampire’s throat – the side that hadn’t been ripped through, anyway – proved differently.

Chanyeol stares down at it, and the oddest urge to vomit rises within him. Not because of the corpse, or the fact that it’s one of his kind, but because he recognizes that Mark. He knows it intimately, even more so than the one branded on his arm.

It’s _his_ Mark.

Only one other vampire has that Mark, and he’s safe on the other half of the world in Los Angeles.

Rage rises within him, mingled with disgust, and all of a sudden, he’s afraid of what he’ll do to the body if he keeps looking at it any longer. He must make a noise, because Baekhyun turns to look at him, suddenly so close, too close, and Chanyeol backs away, shaking his head, before he turns abruptly and heads down the alleyway.

“Chanyeol? Chanyeol—”

He doesn’t stop, even when Baekhyun’s voice grows more worried from behind him. He’s almost out of the alleyway entirely when he feels Baekhyun’s leather-clad hand latch around his wrist. Even that strikes a chord in Chanyeol, and he shakes it off harshly without thinking.

“Chanyeol, look at me.” Baekhyun’s voice is calm, and he doesn’t seem offended that Chanyeol had thrown him off like that. Finally, that more than anything else eases some of the fire slowly banking inside him, and he fills his lungs with a deep, unnecessary breath before turning to face Baekhyun, making sure that his expression is carefully neutral.

Baekhyun looks at him with nothing but naked concern in his eyes. “Are you okay?”

 _I don’t deserve this man_ , Chanyeol thinks. “I’m fine.”

“Sorry, I didn’t know it was a – one of your kind. I should’ve asked the caller.” Frustration flashes across his eyes for a brief second, and he rakes a hand through his silver hair. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” Chanyeol closes his eyes, presses back the sight of the Mark imprinted on his eyelids, and resists the urge to snap out his fangs and attack, protect what’s his. It’s easier to let Baekhyun think that he felt unsettled at seeing one of his own kind dead, and so, he does, never mind the fact that he’s probably killed more vampires under _her_ orders than the amount of vampire corpses Baekhyun’s ever seen. It’s an excuse more than anything else, but right now, he doesn’t think he can stand possibly explaining the insult of the imitation Mark without snapping.

“It is,” Baekhyun insists, before he tentatively reaches for Chanyeol’s hand again, and this time, Chanyeol lets him. “You can just stay here. I’ll take over the rest.”

His thumb rubs over the delicate skin between Chanyeol’s thumb and index finger before he drops Chanyeol’s hand and turns back into the alleyway. Chanyeol stands there for a moment longer before suddenly, his knees can’t hold him any longer, and he sits heavily on one of the wooden crates piled next to the wall. He places his elbows on his knees, leaning over, and his hands tangle in his hair. The concrete is scuffed between his sneakers, littered with stray marks and cigarette ashes, and he tries to think.

It’s difficult, but at last, he manages to suppress the instinctual protective urge that had risen so strongly inside him. It’s a hardwired drive to defend – because though the Mark had been carefully tailored, at least from first glance, to appear like his, his body and mind had recognized it as foreign, a threat. Added to that is the insult that someone would dare use his unique Mark – his very identity as a vampire, boiled down into a few sweeping, arching lines.

He’s not an idiot. There’s no other vampire who would so blatantly, so shamelessly, imitate another vampire’s Mark and leave it in plain sight on a disfigured corpse for him to find in Seoul. Clearly, this is her warning, and this is his rude wakeup call. This is his complacency, this is his payback for thinking that he could hide his return to Korea. This is her threat, and even more than the insolence of the fake Mark, this is her showing that she has the power to draw out Baekhyun and play with him. The caller had made no mistake in failing to identify the type of corpse, Chanyeol knows with certainty.

This is chess, and she’s made her first move.

Baekhyun’s touch on his shoulder startles him, and he stands up in a flash, tense, before relaxing when he realizes it’s just Baekhyun. “Oh. You’re done?”

“All done.” Baekhyun nods. He smells like the waxy tint of kerosene and the woodsy edges of smoke. The body must have been burned then, out of protocol. Chanyeol bites down a complaint of disappointment. It’s his fault for getting so caught up in his own thoughts and instincts. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. I’m fine. I was just startled.” Chanyeol hears the car pull up behind them and follows when Baekhyun heads past him towards the vehicle.

Once they’re both inside and on their way back to the headquarters, Baekhyun peels off his gloves and tosses them on the seat beside him. Some time passes before Baekhyun opens his mouth again, but before he can speak, Chanyeol says, “Don’t you dare apologize again. I already told you it wasn’t your fault.” _There’s nothing you could’ve done about that._

“I wasn’t going to,” Baekhyun says, entirely unconvincingly. “I’ve never... well, I’ve seen my fair share of vampire corpses. But those were only ever at the hands of hunters and hunter-made weapons. I’ve never seen...”

He trails off, and they both think of the way the vampire’s throat had been torn open. Thankfully bloodlessly, but also not surprising, since Chanyeol doubts that the vampire had been allowed to feed after being turned if it had been hunted down so brutally. He wonders what this one had done to get on her nerves, or if she had turned him purely to use as a threat. “It wasn’t a hunter that killed it.”

“It might not have been a vampire either,” Baekhyun insists, but he relents when Chanyeol sends him an incredulous look. “Fine. Maybe. But this is only one incident, regardless. I’ll report it to the Commander and see what he has to say about it.”

Probably not much, since by now, Chanyeol’s pretty sure that she and the rest of the traditionalists had gone almost entirely undercover somewhere after his disappearance to America. It coincided almost too perfectly with Junmyeon’s rise through the hunter ranks, so he doubts the Commander, competent as he is, has seen anything more than Baekhyun. The vampire feuds had been kept deeply private even before the switch in leadership at the hunter division, cleaning up of casualties included, and no matter how petty the covens had been towards each other, they had always held one race in even more contempt: humanity.

The rest of the car ride back is filled with silence. It’s only when they’re back at the headquarters and Baekhyun is about to walk down the corridor leading to Junmyeon’s office that Chanyeol calls for him to stop. Baekhyun turns back expectantly.

“Next time, if you get a call like this, ask Jongdae to go with you,” he says seriously.

Annoyance, tinged with something too close to hurt, crosses Baekhyun’s face. “Why? You think I have to be kept on a leash now too? I’m more than capable of taking care of myself, vampire or not.”

“No, no—” Chanyeol rubs a hand across his face. “No. I know you’re capable.” _I just don’t trust her, and I don’t want to lose you_. “Or take me if you don’t want to ask Jongdae. If you’re going to respond to anonymous calls alone, tell me and I’ll go. It doesn’t matter what it’s for. Tell me and I’ll go with you.”

Baekhyun just looks at him for a long second, fingers playing with the gloves clenched in his hands. Chanyeol doesn’t know what expression is in his eyes, or what goes through Baekhyun’s mind, but finally, Baekhyun nods.

“Thank you,” Chanyeol says, and watches Baekhyun wave slightly before disappearing into Junmyeon’s office.

He stands there for a moment longer before turning and heading to the second floor and his studio.

It’s time to start planning.

 

 

They fall into a new sort of routine. It would have been draining for someone like Chanyeol, who’s truthfully more the type to hole up inside for more days out of the week than not, had he not been, well, incapable of physical exhaustion. As it is, he finds himself marveling at the sheer amount of determination that must drive someone as small as Baekhyun to keep running around every day. It’s either that, or his dislike of Chanyeol’s kind, barring Chanyeol himself, it seems.

Regardless, he’s with Baekhyun almost every moment of the day now. When Baekhyun takes a call, which is often enough, he drops by and gathers Chanyeol from the studio. There’s still the sunlit evenings and the studio nights, but as the days steadily edge deeper into fall, they stay on the roof less and less. Junmyeon even ends up donating a couch to his studio so that Baekhyun has somewhere to sleep instead of the hardwood floor for the increasing amount of nights that he stays over in Chanyeol’s studio.

For a few days, the calls are mostly harmless. Chanyeol hangs in the back as Baekhyun deals with the vast amount of false alarms and few victims. But then the second corpse shows up.

It’s better this time around, since he’s prepared himself, but it’s no less unsettling to see his Mark so blatantly displayed on someone else. The rage simmers low in the back of his throat, and he only realizes that he’s unconsciously clenched his fists when Baekhyun looks at him, concerned. He forces himself to relax. “I’m okay. Really, I knew what I was getting into when you took the call,” he says, when Baekhyun doesn’t seem convinced, and stoops to look at the body so he doesn’t have to look at Baekhyun.

It’s more gruesome this time, and bloodier as well. Clearly this vampire had not been as starved as the other one had, and blood stains the concrete underneath the spots where the limbs have been torn from the body. His Mark stares upwards from one outstretched palm, dark red and wrong.

Now that he has a chance to look at it up close, he can clearly tell it’s not his. It’s not hers either; hers is far too ugly and twisted to be able to be disguised as his. Although he doesn’t recognize the owner of the almost invisible original Mark underlaid the mocking imitation of his, he does recognize the careful artistry of the new Mark. It can be no one but Kyungsoo, who always does his best even when he despises the one he works for.

Any vampire can tell the basic distinction, but for a human, Marks are probably all too similar to distinguish properly between them, at least at first glance, or so Chanyeol thinks. He’s pleasantly surprised and faintly proud when Baekhyun frowns from where he’s kneeling next to him and asks, “I feel like this ... Mark, is that what you called it? It looks familiar.”

He reaches out a leather-clad hand to touch it, but thankfully, he stops before he actually makes contact. Good thing too, because the protective urge rises again within Chanyeol at the sight of Baekhyun almost touching that monstrosity, and he barely resists the urge to lash out and knock Baekhyun’s hand away.

He should just tell Baekhyun. He knows that there’s nothing to be gained from hiding this, and that nothing good will come out of it. But – for some inexplicable reason, he can’t. He doesn’t want to reveal that this is all his fault, that it’s targeted at him, and that if he just left and went back to her, then it would all stop. He doesn’t want to leave Baekhyun.

It’s only the second body, he tells himself. It can still be a coincidence.

“It’s not impossible for a Mark to look similar.”

“Hmm.” Baekhyun stares at it a moment more, furrowing his brows, before finally shaking his head. “There’s still no sign of the attacker or what their motive could be, huh.”

Chanyeol stays silent.

Sighing, Baekhyun stands and brushes off his knees. “I’m going to burn the body then.” He takes a flask of oil from his hip and looks at Chanyeol uncertainly. “I’m not sure...” He doesn’t finish his sentence, but Chanyeol waves him off.

“Don’t worry about me. I’m not bothered by it, really.”

“If you’re sure.” Baekhyun uncorks the flask and drizzles a thin line of oil over the body, before touching the flame of a silver-edged lighter to the piece of paper with the address of the call location on it. It lights easily, and he flicks it onto the body, where it catches aflame instantly.

Vampires burn quickly, maybe because of their natural opposition towards heat and light. Either way, the body is nothing but ashes in a matter of moments, and only the bloodstains still dark on the ground remain a reminder of what once was there.

Chanyeol stares at the spot where the hand had laid for a second longer, before the sensation of Baekhyun’s hand wrapping around his brings him back to reality. He lifts his head to see Baekhyun looking at him with a strangely unreadable, soft expression in his eyes. “Let’s go,” he says, and leads Chanyeol back to the car.

Another odd thing Chanyeol has noticed, over the course of the past few days, is Baekhyun’s increasing inclination towards touch.

It’s almost overshadowed under everything else, but when he looks back, it’s clearly there, obvious as day. It’s still always through the barrier of something – leather gloves, cotton shirt – but it’s contact nonetheless. The press of a hand to his during a call, a slap against his shoulder when Baekhyun finds something particularly funny. It’s so smooth that it’s almost natural, yet when Chanyeol tests it by trying to fake an accidental brush of bare skin against skin when reaching over Baekhyun at the piano, he’s still evaded as easily as before.

So Chanyeol resigns himself to this new half-touch, because he’s sure that this is the closest he will get. And if this means that Baekhyun will touch him, in some way or form, he’ll take it.

Then the attack happens.

It’s a stupid mistake, and he should’ve been more careful. He should’ve sensed the vampire before she even had the chance to reach them, but he had been distracted and focused on nothing but Baekhyun’s look of sorrow when he had seen the human victim.

The attack isn’t even related to the earlier vampire deaths. It’s a trap, pure and simple, laid by an overzealous vampire who was clearly drunk on her recent conquest and thought that it wouldn’t be a big deal to take down a hunter or two while she was at it. The exact type of vampire that Chanyeol despises.

It all happens very fast. One second, he’s watching Baekhyun gently close the terrified eyes of the victim, and the next, he’s reacting on instinct, throwing himself behind Baekhyun as something sharp drags its way down his back, searing and intense. Chanyeol lashes out with his mind, a harsh slam of fury and wrath that must hit hard, as the vampire lets out an agonized wail and staggers back. Before Baekhyun can react, he snatches the stake from the sheath at the hunter’s waist, spins around, and bears down on the vampire.

She’s crouched on the ground, hands clenched around her head, but when she sees him approach, she still staggers up. Her eyes are pain-filled and vehement, but that’s replaced with confusion when she sees the stake burning an imprint into his palm. “You—”

“Shut up,” Chanyeol snarls, and stabs the stake – quick, in and out – into her stomach. She gasps and collapses back on the floor.

“Betrayer,” she hisses, clawed hands darting towards him in a feeble attack that Chanyeol easily sidesteps. He crushes her hand with one foot, and she screams.

“I hardly think failing to associate with your kind makes me a traitor,” he says coldly, and grinds his heel down until he can feel her bones crunch under the pressure.

She gasps, even as a manic grin spreads across her gaunt face. Her eyes flicker behind him, and she licks her lips. “Maybe not. Are you just waiting till the right moment to devour him? He looks... _tasty_. I would understand—”

“You don’t fucking deserve to lay your filthy eyes on him,” Chanyeol growls, and then everything goes red and black.

He comes back to himself slowly. First he thinks he hears his name being called over and over, and then he feels someone dragging his arm back and prying the stake from his grip. Finally, he blinks, and Baekhyun’s pale face swims into focus in front of him, highlighted by the wan light of the moon.

“Chanyeol...?” Baekhyun’s voice is small, and he looks uncertain. There’s blood on his cheek, and Chanyeol snaps into clarity in a heartbeat.

“Baekhyun? Are you hurt?” He steps closer, hand lifting unconsciously before he remembers that that would be a violation of their unspoken rule. The movement causes pain to burn through his right palm, and he flinches, looking at his own hand. It’s burned almost raw in the shape of a stake’s hilt. “What...?”

“Thank goodness,” Baekhyun mumbles, before stepping in and wrapping his arms around Chanyeol. Before he has time to process it, Baekhyun is already stepping back, splashing oil over the – _something_ – on the ground. His hand is shaking when he flicks on the lighter, and in the dim flickering glow of the flame, the black streaks on the wall gleam glistening red. It’s only when the corpse is burning that Chanyeol realizes it’s what remains of the vampire that had tried to attack them – attack _Baekhyun_.

“Baekhyun,” he tries again, but Baekhyun only shakes his head and walks out of the alley, the flames dying behind him in a sad crackle of sparks.

The car ride back to the headquarters is tense and silent, and all Chanyeol can think is, _this is it_. He’s lost Baekhyun’s trust for good, and Chanyeol’s probably a monster in his eyes now.

Before they enter the building, Baekhyun turns swiftly to tug the hood of Chanyeol’s sweatshirt over his head. “Keep your head down,” he says, voice so carefully neutral that something in Chanyeol’s chest drops. He nods and does as Baekhyun says. He’s not quite sure if he’s supposed to be following Baekhyun, but he isn’t sent away, even as Baekhyun orders someone to send a cleanup squad to their previous location, even as they climb up the stairs past the floor with the studio, past the floor of Chanyeol’s bedroom, until they reach the next level. Baekhyun marches down the hall without looking back, and Chanyeol follows hesitantly.

They stop in front of a door at the end of the hall – and all of a sudden, Chanyeol realizes where they are. ( _“If you need anything, I’m on the floor above. I’m at the end of the hall, facing west.”_ It feels like a lifetime ago, the awkwardly polite Baekhyun that he had first met.)

“I can’t—” he starts, when Baekhyun unlocks the door and walks inside.

“Shut up and come in, unless you want to walk the whole hall,” Baekhyun snaps.

Put like that, Chanyeol has no choice but to enter. He stays at the very threshold of the room, back pressed against the door, hood still pulled low over his eyes. Baekhyun flicks on the lights, and when he sees that Chanyeol doesn’t move, he sighs exasperatedly and wraps a firm hand around his elbow before tugging him into the adjoining bathroom.

“Sit.” Baekhyun points to the edge of the bathtub, knocking aside the worn blue shower curtain. He starts rummaging through the cupboard above the toilet. “And take off your sweatshirt.”

Chanyeol edges past Baekhyun to get to the bathtub, and in doing so, he accidentally looks in the mirror. With a shock, he realizes why Baekhyun had told him to keep his hood low over his face. His eyes glow red, the same kind of fiery burn that only crawls out when he’s on the edge of thirst-frenzy. With a concentrated effort, he pushes away the last of the simmering energy still boiling inside him, and the color leeches away.

“What are you waiting for? Hurry up.” If Baekhyun notices the change in his eyes, he doesn’t say anything, merely points at the edge of the bathtub and cocks his head, first aid kit cradled in his arm.

“Baekhyun—”

When Chanyeol doesn’t move immediately, Baekhyun rolls his eyes and sets the first aid kit on the sink with a clatter before reaching for the hem of Chanyeol’s sweatshirt and tugging up. Surprised into compliance, Chanyeol lifts his arms and lets Baekhyun wrestle off his blood-stained sweatshirt. Luckily, it’s black, but even with that, it’s ruined beyond wear with the claw marks in the back.

“This is why I told you to sit, you’re way too tall,” Baekhyun complains, before pushing Chanyeol towards the bathtub. Even the thin leather of the glove isn’t enough to mask the heat pressing intimately into Chanyeol’s shoulder, and he suppresses a shudder.

Chanyeol finally does sit, but he shakes his head when Baekhyun approaches with the first aid kit again. “I don’t need it. My back is healed already.” The vampire’s attack had hardly been severe, and he had been at enough strength that the healing had started almost automatically. Not even scars are left now, he knows.

“Not that. Your hand.” Baekhyun kneels between Chanyeol’s knees and holds out a hand impatiently, wiggling his fingers. When Chanyeol stares at him, confused, Baekhyun snatches Chanyeol’s hand, spreading his fingers to reveal his burned palm. At that, the injury twinges painfully, and Chanyeol can’t suppress the shudder that runs through him. “See? Silver hurts.”

“It’s not like I won’t heal eventually.”

“Shut up,” Baekhyun mutters, fumbling with the first aid kit before sighing. In one smooth movement, he strips off his leather gloves and unlatches the kit.

Then, with an incredibly natural grace, he touches Chanyeol for the first time.

His fingertips are gentle, so unbelievably gentle, where they press into Chanyeol’s hand as Baekhyun carefully probes around his wound. He can feel the calluses from a life of handling a stake, but it feels normal, expected, on someone like Baekhyun. Delicate, but with a core of steel.

Chanyeol stares at the head of silver below him, focuses on the pinpricks of heat against the faint burn of the wound, and tries to stay afloat amidst the emotions swelling through him.

“I’m not sure if this will work, to be honest, but it speeds our healing, so it should be fine,” Baekhyun’s saying, and his hands leave Chanyeol’s to pick up an unmarked, white tube from the kit. An irrational sense of loss plunges through him at the absence of contact. Baekhyun spreads some of the cream from the tube onto his fingers before warning, “This might sting.”

It does, and quite a bit actually, but the warmth of Baekhyun’s fingers against his, _finally_ , after what feels like a lifetime of craving, overpowers everything else. Baekhyun’s touch is tender but firm, and after spreading the cream, he carefully wraps a layer of gauze around Chanyeol’s entire hand. The wound had been imprinted into both his palm and his fingers where they had clenched around the silver of the stake, and by the end of it all, he kind of looks like a mummy.

They both stare at his hand in silence, before Chanyeol bursts out laughing at the absurdity of it all.

“What,” Baekhyun says, offended, but it only makes Chanyeol laugh harder and harder, until he’s doubled against his knees, injured hand cradled against his chest.

“You’re awful at this,” he gasps between snorts, and Baekhyun’s (bare) hand slaps hard against the skin of his back. The skin is still tender from where it had healed, and he flinches. “Ow!”

“That’s what you get,” Baekhyun sniffs, but when Chanyeol lifts up his head, it’s to see a faint smile on Baekhyun’s lips as well. “After I took the time to bandage you up and everything.”

“You call this first aid? You literally just wrapped the entire roll of gauze around my hand.”

“I’m just taking safety precautions!”

This makes Chanyeol burst out laughing all over again, and this time Baekhyun does as well, though his are quieter. Finally, they both quiet, and Chanyeol looks at the smudge of dried blood on Baekhyun’s cheek. It’s cracked, flecks of rust dripping down his cheek from where he had scrunched his cheeks laughing. “You’re not hurt, are you?”

Baekhyun looks at him before carefully repacking the first aid kit and closing it. “No.”

“That’s good. That’s... good,” he repeats to himself. He doesn’t deserve this – Baekhyun’s concern, his touch, his trust. Not any of it, when he clearly has the potential to snap at any moment. “I—”

“Thank you,” Baekhyun interrupts him, and the abruptness of it jolts Chanyeol into stillness. Baekhyun lifts his head to stare straight into Chanyeol’s eyes. “You told me not to apologize for all the times I cruelly brought you to something you didn’t deserve to see. So I’m telling you not to apologize for saving my life.”

“I couldn’t even control myself.” Chanyeol remembers flickers of red and black and anger and blatant possessiveness, and shame runs through him.

“You wouldn’t hurt me,” Baekhyun says with a confidence that Chanyeol doesn’t understand.

“You never know.”

Baekhyun levels him with a look. “I know.” He reaches out to tap Chanyeol’s chest, lightly, two dots of electric heat. “And you know too.” He stands and places the first aid kit back into the cupboard before tugging out a towel from the same cupboard. “Take a shower. I need to report to the Commander.”

Chanyeol gestures to his cheek. “Hold on.” He carefully wets a corner of the towel with water from the sink and rubs it across Baekhyun’s cheek until the blood fades away. “Okay.”

Baekhyun smiles crookedly at him, gleaming and bright, before he leaves.

Chanyeol very quickly discovers that it’s rather impossible to take a shower with the current state of his mummified hand, and he doesn’t want to undo Baekhyun’s hard work, so he settles for soaking the towel completely and wiping off the bloodstains awkwardly with his left hand. The majority of it is on his back, though there are some on his face from where her blood must’ve splashed onto him, like Baekhyun. The towel is stained pink once he’s done, and he folds it clumsily along with his sweatshirt before placing it on the counter of the sink.

He’s not quite sure what to do after. Baekhyun hadn’t explicitly told him to leave – but he hadn’t exactly told him to stay either. Chanyeol wanders into the bedroom, which is similar to his own, though there are more dressers and pieces of furniture. Overall, though, it’s still fairly empty for the bedroom of someone who’s supposedly stayed here for most of his life. There’s only one picture placed in a frame on the bedside table, and Chanyeol recognizes Baekhyun as a child smiling cheerfully up at the camera, an unfamiliar man and woman standing behind him. There’s a gaping hole in the photo to Baekhyun’s left, right over the face of the boy standing next to him, arms draped over Baekhyun’s small shoulders.

He feels invasive, somehow, looking at the photo, so he sits in the armchair in the corner of the room next to the bookshelf. As soon as he sits down, the exhaustion rips through him – not physical, but mental, fatigue from overstraining his strength. The burst of glamour and the healing are taking their toll, before he can help it, his eyes slide shut on their own accord, and Chanyeol sleeps.

The flickering lights still swirl around him, but they’re murkier, darker, as if he’s sinking deeper and deeper. They’re fading, far away, twinkling like dying stars, and he can’t, he can’t leave, he needs to stay for—

Then a familiar presence burns through the haze, bright and earnest like the glow of a sunset, and settles near him. It anchors him, and he stops sinking.

He wakes ten hours and forty-six minutes later to the sight of Baekhyun asleep, curled next to him on the bed, and the glow only strengthens when he realizes that Baekhyun must have carried Chanyeol to his bed somehow while he was sleeping. The corner of the blanket falls off his chest as he sits up, and he reaches out his left hand to touch Baekhyun’s cheek, overwhelmed at the emotion carried by such a simple movement. He’s allowed to now, something inside him rejoices, he can touch and touch and _touch_ this beautiful, beautiful human.

It’s that exact moment, hand pressed against Baekhyun’s cheek, warmth burning itself into his palm, that Chanyeol realizes for the first time, with a sensation of freefalling exhilaration and utter fear, that he thinks he might be in love with Byun Baekhyun.

 

 

Something changes, inevitably, and it’s not just the new, unfamiliar hyperconscious tension buzzing like a thick wall between them.

It’s as if some torrent has been unleashed from deep within Baekhyun, some yearning that is just as unfathomable as Chanyeol’s cravings for his touch. They’re the small things: the brush of his bare hand against Chanyeol’s when they bump shoulders in the hallway, the absent slide of skin against skin when he reaches over Chanyeol to tap at a piano key. More than the newfound skin-ship, it’s just the increase in contact in general that gets to him.

That unbridgeable one-inch gap that had seemed as wide as a yawning abyss – it seems that it wasn’t so hard to close after all.

Baekhyun is like a puppy, he discovers. When he’s happy, he shows it exuberantly with wide hugs and excited slaps against Chanyeol’s arm. When he’s sleepy, he slumps against him like it’s nothing, drops his head in Chanyeol’s lap as if this had never once been something he wouldn’t have done. Baekhyun pokes and prods and pinches and tickles, invades his space until Chanyeol wonders at how Baekhyun had managed to survive this long at all without touching somebody else.

He gets used to it alarmingly fast, and even begins to come to take it for granted, this steady warmth by his side. They end up spending most of their time either in the studio or out on calls, and Chanyeol makes progress on his new song at a speed that’s fast even for him. With Baekhyun at his side, however, it makes sense, as he’s always quick to point out when a beat doesn’t sound quite right, or when more harmony should be added here or there. The lyrics are beginning to come together into his head, and he thinks – no, he knows – that he wants Baekhyun to sing them, but he doesn’t know how to ask, doesn’t know if he’s allowed to yet.

He doesn’t want to break this tentative relationship growing between them before it’s even had a chance to blossom.

Unfortunately, the calls don’t just stop, and finally, after the fourth vampire body appears bearing Chanyeol’s false Mark, Baekhyun notices.

“This is definitely not a coincidence anymore,” he says, looking at his phone where he had taken a picture of the last vampire’s Mark, much to Chanyeol’s discontent. It isn’t any less jarring on a flat, 2D screen than it is in real life. “I think the Commander should see this.”

Unexpectedly, he looks at Chanyeol, as if seeking some implicit approval. There’s no way Chanyeol can keep putting it off without arousing suspicion, especially with photographic evidence right there, so he nods tightly. “How will you transport it back?”

“I’ll call the cleanup team. They have special equipment to deal with it.” Baekhyun sends a quick report through the radio before they head back to the headquarters to brief Junmyeon before the cleanup crew returns.

Junmyeon takes it seriously, hands crossed on his desk as he listens to Baekhyun. Clearly it isn’t a new topic of concern, but still, he doesn’t give any less attention to it because of that. Near the end of the briefing, someone knocks on the door and informs them that the cleanup team has returned. Baekhyun takes a look at Chanyeol, who nods. “I can finish up,” he says, and Baekhyun smiles – a quick, sweet thing that sends something jolting down Chanyeol’s spine – before he presses slender fingers to his shoulder in a farewell.

“I’ll be back,” he says, and nods to Junmyeon. “Commander.”

“Dismissed,” Junmyeon acknowledges. As soon as the door swings shut behind Baekhyun, he’s turning to look at Chanyeol with wide eyes and raised eyebrows. “So.”

“So?”

Junmyeon looks meaningfully at him – or more exactly, his shoulder. Chanyeol looks at it too, not understanding for a moment, before he remembers Baekhyun’s light touch a second ago. He’s gotten so used to the casual contact in the past few days that it hadn’t even registered as abnormal. “Oh.”

“Oh,” Junmyeon repeats.

“What about it?” Chanyeol can’t help but ask a little challengingly.

Junmyeon holds up his hands, but he’s smiling. “Nothing, nothing. I’m just happy. For the both of you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Chanyeol frowns, but then Baekhyun is back.

He ushers both of them down a narrow hallway directly to the right of the main lobby. It’s sterilized and white and reminds Chanyeol of the hospitals he’s seen in movies and television dramas. When he takes a tentative breath in, it stinks of the bitterness of chemicals and formaldehyde, with the distinct tinge of hawthorn incense and ash. The hallway leads to only one set of double doors, styled to be opened either way for the ease of wheeling something like a, well, a gurney or a coffin through. It’s not a reach of an assumption for him to make, especially when he sees the corpse they had brought back lying strapped onto a steel table, shackled with silver.

An unfamiliar man stands next to the steel table, who grins widely when he sees them walk in.

“Commander! And you must be Chanyeol.” His Korean has a slight accent to it, which is explained when Baekhyun introduces him.

“This is Yixing, our resident mortician. He’s from China originally, but came to Korea about six years ago, and he’s been with us ever since.”

“Nice to meet you,” Chanyeol responds, nodding.

“You know, I’ve heard a lot about you. Someday, if you don’t mind, could I take a look at your Mark? Baekhyun said—”

“Yixing!” Embarrassment colors Baekhyun’s voice, and he slaps a hand over Yixing’s mouth. Jealousy flashes through Chanyeol with an intensity that even startles him, and he shakes his head. Jeez, what is he? Some newborn desperate for attention?

Meanwhile, Junmyeon takes a step closer to the corpse on the table, or what’s left of it, anyway. It seems that the cleanup team had only decided to bring the upper half back – either that, or Yixing had stored the legs somewhere else. The Mark is clearly visible on the collarbone of the body.

“So what can you tell us about this?” Junmyeon’s natural authority resettles the atmosphere in the room, and Yixing turns back seriously.

“Marks – the correct term, yes, Chanyeol? – are something we’ve seen before. I’m sure we all know that they’re associated with the bite of a newborn’s sire—”

“Mentor,” Chanyeol can’t help but correct. “Sire is an incredibly outdated term.” When all three of the humans turn at once to stare at him, he shrugs. “Sorry. Habit.”

Yixing nods graciously. “No, thank you, Chanyeol. They’re associated with the bite of a mentor. Up until now, however, we haven’t truly looked at them as a way of identification. This is the first time multiple Marks have appeared on vampire corpses – a rarity as well. We seldom see vampires killed by other vampires.”

“This is already the fourth case as well. I would definitely say this is no longer a coincidence.” Baekhyun frowns, crossing his arms. “But what motive would a vampire have to kill its own kind? And all those of the same si—mentor as well?”

“A feud?” Yixing suggests. “We had quite a few of those in China. The hunter division isn’t as developed there, especially in the rural areas, so vampire feuds for territory were common.”

Junmyeon’s brows knit together. “What reason would there be for a feud? There haven’t been reports of large covens banding together.”

Yixing shrugs. “The bigger problem is that these Marks are all those of the recently turned. Obviously this is conjecture based on the photo Baekhyun showed me of the last corpse’s Mark, but I believe it’s most likely around the same time frame as this one. Definitely turned within the last week or two.”

“So someone’s been turning, and most likely without consent.” Baekhyun turns to Chanyeol and gestures to the Mark. “This might be a stretch, but... do you recognize the Mark?”

 _It’s mine_ , he almost says. _It’s not mine._

He knows. He knows this would be the perfect time to explain – to say that, yes, he recognizes this Mark because it’s more familiar to him than the sound of his own name. It’s his but not his, wrong and right, a mocking forgery meant to threaten him.

But maybe it’s just a scare tactic. She wouldn’t go after the hunter division outright, not with him right here claiming it, and the only one he really cares about in this whole city is the silver-haired hunter standing next to him. And in the end, Chanyeol is nothing but another coward, another vampire too addicted to warmth and gentle touch. He doesn’t want to see the distrust in Baekhyun’s eyes again, the cold aloofness and rigid morality that someone like Chanyeol has long since discarded. He doesn’t want Baekhyun to know just how much he doesn’t know about the vampire that Chanyeol is and the things that he has once done under her name.

It’ll be okay, he tells himself.

He can handle it. He can protect Baekhyun.

And so Chanyeol lies.

“No, I don’t. I’m sorry,” he says, not really sorry at all.

Baekhyun nods and accepts it. “Hm, well, it was worth a try. There are thousands of your kind out there, after all.”

He’s safe in his lie, he thinks. The only other one who could possibly disprove it is far, far away from Seoul.

Nonetheless, in a last-ditch effort, he tries to divert the track of the case entirely. “To be honest, why even bother to investigate the case? Vampire feuds are hardly uncommon, like Yixing said. No need for humans to be involved.”

“I’ve already heard of rumors of unrest at the blood banks. I don’t want this to keep spreading and eventually tear down the entire system. When we build a foundation based on trust, we have to show them that we won’t betray that trust.” Junmyeon looks at him steadily with the quiet confidence of a leader who doesn’t have to use arrogance to earn his place. And Chanyeol wishes, more than anything, that this could’ve been the kind of world where that type of leader was enough.

“You’re a good man, Kim Junmyeon,” he says, and smiles crookedly.

“No better than you,” Junmyeon says easily, before turning to Baekhyun. “I’ll tell all the hunters to keep an eye out on any more related cases and to report back if they see anything suspicious or hear anything on the patrols.”

“Got it.”

“And be safe, okay?”

Baekhyun laughs and saunters over to Chanyeol’s side, hooking his arm through his. “Come on, with Chanyeol by my side, I’m practically invincible.”

They all laugh, Chanyeol included, and he tries to tell himself that it’s true.

That he’ll be able to protect Baekhyun, when it comes down to the moment that it truly matters.

 

 

The first time they kiss is a surprise in the way that they’ve both seen it long since coming – they just didn’t know when or how or where it was going to happen.

Chanyeol catches Baekhyun looking at him, sometimes, with dark eyes and moist lips. He catches him looking because he himself is always, always looking at Baekhyun; he has been since the day they met, and he hasn’t been able to take his eyes off since.

There are several missed moments before the real one occurs. Once, at the studio, when it’s late at night and everything is just a little hazier because of it, Baekhyun half-asleep and leaning against Chanyeol’s side, looking up with just that tiny, tiny centimeter of space between them. Almost—almost, but at the last moment, both had turned away. Once again when they’re on the tail end of an exhilarating chase, and finally, they apprehend the vampire, and Baekhyun swings up on his tiptoes and presses the barest edge of a kiss against Chanyeol’s cheek, so close to his mouth that he can feel the warmth of his breath on his lips. But it hadn’t been what he needed, what he wanted, what he’s been craving since the first time Baekhyun touched him with pinpricks of heat against a blaze of red.

It happens after a tragedy, the kind that’s just cruel enough to leave an orphan to face the world alone. Baekhyun is strangely quiet after they take care of the feral vampire and leave the scene to Junmyeon and the caretakers. Back at the headquarters, Chanyeol is briefly stopped by Yixing with a question on the placement of Marks, and by the time he extracts himself from the conversation, Baekhyun is already long gone.

The sky still isn’t dark outside, however, so he knows where to find him.

It’s oddly reminiscent of that first day he had gone to search for Baekhyun. Just like back then, when he opens the door to the roof, he’s stunned into silence, and he can do nothing except look. The wind is colder now as the full extent of autumn begins to settle down in preparation for winter, and he knows that they most likely can’t keep coming to the roof to watch the sunset for much longer. But the sunset today is extraordinary – the reds and oranges rip across the deepening navy fabric of the night sky and light the underbellies of the clouds ablaze with the fiery burn of the setting sun. Everything is hazy and surreal in the light. A living dream, made all the more unreal by the human standing next to the railing, looking over Seoul.

Baekhyun doesn’t react, even when Chanyeol is by his side. Chanyeol doesn’t quite know what to say, how to empathize on a level that he no longer understands – after all, his own family is nothing but a blur of the vaguest sensations in his distant memory. So, he leans against the railing and looks down, counting the cars that rush by below, and waits.

Finally, when the sun is about to dip below the horizon, Baekhyun speaks.

“I’m tired, Chanyeol,” he says, so softly it’s almost a whisper.

He doesn’t ask why things like this can’t be prevented, why the world is so unfair. He doesn’t ask any of that, and Chanyeol thinks his heart breaks a tiny bit.

“That’s life, running us towards exhaustion until we ultimately give in,” he answers.

Baekhyun snorts a little, but his voice is still a thin thread when he says, “Sometimes I wonder what it must be like to live forever. I think about how great it would be not to have to sleep or eat or get sick. Then I think about how tired I feel all the time, and... aren’t you tired, Chanyeol?” He turns to him, then, and in his eyes, Chanyeol drowns.

He _was_ tired, before, when he was surrounded day in and day out by the same struggle for power, the same irrational hatred and vehement anger towards a race that was weaker, smaller, less powerful, but still was _better_ , because of how they deeply they felt and how selflessly they cared. He was tired even when he found his place in his music, because like that two-handed piano, something had just been off. But now, he’s no longer tired. He no longer thinks, in the depths of his mind, of what it must be like to sleep deeply. He wants to cherish each day, each second, each moment he has with Byun Baekhyun, this impossibly kind and self-sacrificing human who found it within himself to care about someone like Chanyeol.

He cups Baekhyun’s cheeks with his hands. Baekhyun is so small, so delicate in his hands, and he thinks he can feel him trembling – or maybe that’s just Chanyeol himself.

“Can I?” he whispers.

As the sun dips fully below the skyline in a brilliant rush of scarlet, Baekhyun leans up and closes the gap.

 

 

He’s not quite sure how they make it back to Baekhyun’s room, but somehow, they do, and as soon as the door closes, he’s pressing Baekhyun against it and leaning in.

It’s like he’s drunk again, not on wine or liquor but on the heat lingering beneath him, the scent and the taste of Baekhyun against his lips. It’s soft and slow until suddenly, it’s not, and he finds his hands curled tightly through strands of silver hair as Baekhyun shudders beneath him when he licks into his mouth.

“The – the bed,” Baekhyun gasps in between hot kisses, though he’s also wrapped so tightly around Chanyeol that it takes them a long moment to extricate themselves for the scant distance needed to make it to the bed. Even those few feet feel too far.

Baekhyun pushes Chanyeol’s shoulders and forces him to sit on the edge of the bed before crawling onto his lap, a smirk on his face, his calm confidence belied by the flush spreading deliciously to his ears. “Have you ever done this before, Chanyeol?”

“It’s—” He jolts when Baekhyun presses deliberately against him, heat against heat. “It’s been a while.”

“Good. Then you’ll remember this,” Baekhyun whispers, before grinding down again in a movement that leaves them both shaking. He brings their lips back together for a hot, sensual slide before he wraps his arms around Baekhyun’s waist and mouths downward, first to nip at his pinkened earlobe, then the sensitive patch of skin below his ear, and it’s all slow, soft bites down from there. A moan escapes from Baekhyun’s throat when he reaches the delicate junction of where his neck meets shoulder, and he can feel it vibrate against his cheek. Baekhyun’s heartbeat jumps, rabbit-fast, when he licks against the same spot. He wants to _bite_ – it’s so close, the blood, rushing frantically under that pale skin, rushing for Chanyeol. But he curbs it, settles for sucking a dark spot into Baekhyun’s skin, a privately satisfying claim of possession in exchange for the Mark he cannot leave.

Baekhyun’s knees squeeze around his waist, and he jumps when Chanyeol slides his hands under his shirt. “What are you—” he begins, leaning back slightly.

“You’ve already seen me shirtless,” Chanyeol says. Not even once—twice; the first, after he had slept for two days straight, and the second, after Baekhyun had cleaned his wound in the bathroom nearby. He gets the satisfaction of seeing Baekhyun’s eyes darken in memory of it. “I think it’s only fair you return the favor.”

“I see your hand is perfectly healed now,” Baekhyun mutters, and squirms when Chanyeol’s right hand pinches retaliatingly against the skin of his waist. “Ow, ah! You don’t even need me to keep bandaging it!”

“But then I wouldn’t have an excuse for you to touch me,” Chanyeol pouts, and Baekhyun rolls his eyes, albeit with a fond smile on his lips.

“Says the one fondling me right now,” he teases, before leaning back slightly and peeling his shirt off in one smooth moment. For a second, all Chanyeol can see is a long arch of pale, pale skin, before Baekhyun tosses the shirt aside and loops his arms around his neck. “Satisfied?”

Chanyeol responds by sweeping his hands up along Baekhyun’s sides, feeling the muscles beneath his touch ripple as Baekhyun shivers. He’s burning under Chanyeol’s fingers, pure warmth from the body heat of something truly alive, and he doesn’t ever want to let him go.

His eyes fall on the scar wrapping its way over the top of Baekhyun’s shoulder, the only blemish on Baekhyun’s entire body, normally hidden by his everyday clothing, and for a second, he’s startled by its unexpected familiarity.

Then he remembers, and like a puzzle, everything clicks into place.

The déjà vu, Baekhyun’s reaction to the orphan, the ripped picture on his desk. Chanyeol truly, finally _gets_ it.

“Baekbeom is your brother?” he asks before he realizes the words are out of his mouth.

Baekhyun freezes instantly in his lap, and this close, Chanyeol can tell that he’s stopped breathing. He stares at Chanyeol with undisguised shock, and his lips tremble when he says, “How do you know that name?”

(“He was involved in an attack when he was young. He survived, but his parents did not. His brother was newly turned, and it... well, we didn’t have the measures we do now back then.”)

Baekbeom.

Baekhyun.

Baekhyun is Baekbeom’s little brother.

Baekhyun is—

Chanyeol reaches for the scar unconsciously, and Baekhyun flinches back before scrambling off his lap completely. He repeats, this time warily, “How do you know that name? Did the Commander tell you?”

“No, no, he wouldn’t. This—” Chanyeol laughs a little shakily, pressing a hand to his face. The memories surge back, imprinted by years of dust but no less clear for it. How could he forget, after all, the very reason that finally drove him to leave Korea? “You look so much like him.”

No wonder the déjà vu had always arisen whenever Baekhyun was at his most belligerent – he remembers Baekbeom’s face, his fierce, red eyes when he had stared Chanyeol in the face and told him to kill him, but to spare his little brother. Even with his own brother’s blood in his mouth, Baekbeom had tried to protect him. And for the moments the déjà vu had struck when Baekhyun was asleep—well, he’s only ever truly seen Baekhyun when he was unconscious. Ten years or not, his features are still recognizable, perhaps even more so since they’ve only sharpened with age and stress since the time he was sixteen.

“You knew my brother?” A wild mix of emotions flashes across Baekhyun’s face – anger, uncertainty, hope, confusion.

“We weren’t close,” Chanyeol is quick to correct. “The circumstances brought us together.”

“What circumstances?”

Chanyeol hesitates. For once, he finds that it isn’t because of his own selfishness – of how much of his past that will be uncovered if he tells Baekhyun the truth. He just doesn’t know if Baekhyun wants to hear this, truly, to relive a past that has no doubt tormented and haunted him for the past decade.

“Tell me, Chanyeol. Don’t coddle me. I know you think I shouldn’t know. But—please. Please,” Baekhyun begs, almost, voice cracking slightly in the middle, and that breaks his resolve.

Chanyeol thinks back to that night. How he had been increasingly fed up with her petty revenge and tyranny, how she had held the safety of Sehun and Jongin over his head like they were nothing. It was meant to be a quick thing, a sweep-up of a recent feral attack before the then-incompetent hunter division could arrive, and either bringing the newborn to their – her – side or eliminating it if it could not be contained. Any witnesses were to be killed immediately.

He had gone alone, because the case wasn’t meant to be anything special. And at first, it hadn’t been. The sprays of blood on the wall were normal. The limp bodies and torn throats were normal. A middle-aged man and woman, both dressed in formalwear, Chanyeol had discovered when he bent lower to look at their bodies, and not entirely drained of blood either. A messy eater, he had thought absently in his head, and he cringes looking back on it now. Back then, as much as he had looked down on her, he himself hadn’t been that much better.

He found the newborn in the living room, a previously well-decorated space. Glass shards were everywhere, and the wind trickled coldly through the shattered windows, causing the sheer curtains to billow. The newborn had been hunched over something – someone – and hadn’t even noticed when Chanyeol entered the room. Typical, lost in thirst-frenzy.

“Hey there,” he had drawled as he stepped over the glass, not even bothering to conceal his presence. The vampire’s head had snapped up, and in the harsh light of the full moon, he had looked particularly inhuman, eyes glowing red, mouth stained black. But that wasn’t what caught Chanyeol off guard – instead, it was the abject despair on the newborn’s face.

“Kill me,” he had begged, and Chanyeol hadn’t been able to keep the surprise off his face.

“I have to say, I don’t hear that one a lot.” The glass crunched under his shoes as he came to a stop. This close, he could see that the vampire had been hunched over another human, this one much smaller, all thin limbs and skinny torso. His shoulder was a bloody, torn mess, but the vampire hadn’t gone for his throat like he had with the other two humans. “You know, morals are just the excuses humans make for their otherwise reprehensible behavior. In a few years, you won’t even remember this day. Come with me, and you won’t be harmed.” The words had felt like ash on his tongue, wooden and empty, the same words he heard drilled into him night and day, but that he no longer believed in. (After all, there had to be more to this eternal life than just killing, oppressing, drinking, murdering – right?)

The vampire’s expression had flattened – _déjà vu, déjà vu_ – and unexpectedly, some clarity seemed to return to his eyes. “I’m not like you. You might as well be dead already if that’s actually how you think.”

Chanyeol had been about to respond when a small whimper broke through the silence. They both looked down, and Chanyeol raised his eyebrows. The human was actually alive, against all odds. Usually, a newborn’s thirst was insatiable, and all reason was lost to the burn in their throats. Slaves of their greed, nothing more.

Suddenly, the vampire had snarled and lunged across the human’s body. “Don’t touch him.”

“He’s almost dead already,” Chanyeol pointed out. His breathing was extremely shallow to the point that Chanyeol hadn’t even noticed he was still alive upon first coming in.

“You can save him, can’t you? You can turn him?” the vampire had pleaded, hands shaking as he scooped the human into his arms. “I heard—I heard that if your Mark is silver like that, you’ve already turned someone. Please, save my brother, too.”

Chanyeol had looked down and frowned when he realized his shirt sleeves hadn’t been long enough to cover his Mark. Usually, he disliked displaying it so blatantly – a Mark of her possession – but today, he had forgotten his usual sweatshirt in his anger on his way out.

“I have turned someone before, yes,” he said slowly. “But that doesn’t mean I can just save your brother.”

“Why not? It’s not as if you vampires care about _consent_ ,” the newborn spat. “Certainly the one who turned me didn’t.”

“I won’t do it to someone unwilling,” Chanyeol had corrected himself, and the vampire had grinned, triumphantly, and in that moment, he knew he had lost.

“Save him, then.”

“I have to eliminate all witnesses.”

The vampire’s eyes had grown flinty and sharp, and he actually looked almost as if he was ready to attack Chanyeol at that very moment. “I don’t care if you kill me. But if you hurt Baekhyun, I will haunt you to the very ends of this earth.”

And – to this day, Chanyeol doesn’t quite know what stopped him. What finally made him pause for a moment and rethink those empty words he repeated night after night for her sake. Maybe it was out of some twisted vengeance, when everything had finally boiled over and he could stand it no longer. Maybe it was because he had never seen a vampire like this, one who clearly had the empathy to care about this short-lived human even when he was half-lost to the thirst-frenzy. Maybe it was the vague nebulous Mark that had suddenly glowed, bright, from the bloody mess of the human’s shoulder, half-formed but still clear in its intent. A Mark he had never seen before, had never known a newborn could even make.

Because a Mark, while at its most basic form was an identifier and a clear sign of ownership, it was also a bond between mentor and newborn. It was the reason why every vampire knew of the exact moment their mentor ceased to exist. And for some, the Marks ran deeper than that – they were the representation of a blood bond, the strongest relationship a vampire could have with another.

To see a Mark like that, no matter how half-developed and shaky it was, given by a newborn – Chanyeol felt something shift, deep inside him, and he knew there was no going back.

He was about to agree when he heard, so faintly it was almost undetectable, the sound of footsteps from outside. They both caught it, and they froze before locking eyes with each other.

“I’ll help you,” Chanyeol had finally said, a rushed whisper as he hunched down to meet the vampire face-to-face. “But you have to do something for me.”

“What?” the vampire had asked warily back, holding Baekhyun closer in his arms, the Mark pulsing on his shoulder in time to the blood still dripping from the wound.

“You have to break the bond.” He pointed to the Mark, which the vampire looked down at in surprise.

“I did this...?”

“Yes.” There it was again – the footsteps, two pairs, closer this time, walking up the path outside the house. He said urgently, “If he keeps this Mark, he’ll be eliminated by the hunters as a possible threat. They would never allow him to stay alive. But if you break the bond now, the Mark will fade into a scar and nobody will know for the better.” He hesitated, and finally added, “Also, if you don’t want to feel his hatred and despair for taking away your parents for the rest of his life, then I would break it.”

The newborn had taken in a slight breath – still too used to the now unnecessary action of breathing – as he looked down at his brother. “You mean, this pain...”

“Yes. It’s Baekhyun’s you’re feeling, not your own.”

“How? How do I—”

The footsteps stopped outside the front door.

“Reject him. You have to reject him with your mind. I know it’s hard, but if you don’t do this now, you’re going to sentence him to death,” Chanyeol whispered, and the vampire’s face had dropped in sadness. Still, he had nodded firmly, closed his eyes, and a second later, both him and Baekhyun had flinched, before slowly the pulsing red of the half-Mark faded back away into nothing.

The door opened.

“We have to go,” Chanyeol said, and he stood. When the newborn didn’t move, he hissed, “The hunters are here. Do you want to die that badly?”

“I killed my own parents. I almost killed my brother,” he whispered, staring down at his hands.

“If you stay here, do you really think the hunters would be any less forgiving than me? That time they spend killing you could very well cause Baekhyun to die,” Chanyeol snapped back, and that had finally caused the vampire to jolt into action. He scrambled up next to Chanyeol, and both had made their way to the windows before Chanyeol realized that the hole was too small and too jagged for both of them to make their way through. Cursing, he had picked up one of the footstools to the armchairs lying on its side nearby and smashed it through the window. Instantly, the footsteps had picked up in the hall, and he and the newborn had launched themselves through to the frantic shouts of the hunters behind them, but they were already long gone by the time the hunters reached the living room and the broken boy they had left behind.

“I’m not going back with you,” the newborn said a few minutes later, when they were both far away from the original scene. His mouth was still stained with bloody black, but his eyes were fading fast from their original fiery red.

Chanyeol had nodded before smiling a little bitterly. “I wouldn’t either. But be careful out there. The world isn’t kind for newborns without a mentor to bring them up.”

The vampire had nodded slightly as well, before saying, “My name is Baekbeom. What about yours?”

“Chanyeol.”

“Well, you know, Chanyeol. You’re not too bad either. I don’t think you lack any of those so-called reprehensible morals you talked about. Maybe you lost them for a bit, but I think you found them again. Don’t you?”

And those words had lingered with him when he went home, when she screamed at him and slapped him for leaving a human alive, one small defenseless human who could do nothing to harm her. When she raged against humanity for their idiocy, for their uselessness, and he couldn’t help but think, _Weren’t you once human too?_

The next morning, he had taken Sehun and Jongin, walked out, and had never looked back.

When he finishes, Baekhyun does nothing for a moment except to sit in silence. At some point of the story, his knees had given out, and he’s slumped before Chanyeol now, one hand pressed over the scar on his shoulder. It’s still in the shape of that half-Mark seared into Chanyeol’s memory, a shape he knows he’ll never forget, though it’s light and almost unnoticeable.

He tells Baekhyun almost the entire truth, pardoning the finer details about her. Except that, however, he spares nothing.

After a few long minutes, Baekhyun finally takes in a slow, deep breath. When he exhales, it’s a soft laugh. “You know, I was so surprised by how warm you were when I first touched you.” Chanyeol furrows his brows, but Baekhyun doesn’t look up. “For such a long time, I refused to touch vampires. Not because I thought I was so much better than them, but because I didn’t want to feel that coldness ever again. I couldn’t ever forget it. That’s usually what wakes me up at night, you know. It’s so unbearably cold.” He shivers, and curls around himself.

Chanyeol slides off the bed onto the floor in front of him. He reaches out, slowly, but this time Baekhyun doesn’t flinch away, and Chanyeol pulls him into his arms tightly.

“Even now, you’re warm. You make me feel so warm.” Baekhyun buries his face into Chanyeol’s shoulder, and his arms wind around his back. He can feel Baekhyun’s tremors as they pass through them both. “Why are you so warm, but my brother was so cold?”

“How warm we are depends on how much blood we have inside us. If I don’t feed, I’ll get colder too. But your brother... he was a newborn. Thirst-frenzy feels like it’s burning us alive, but in reality, it’s more like dry ice. So cold that we burn for something warm to sate it, even just a little. That’s how it’s so easy for those newborns to lose themselves to the frenzy.”

It’s something Chanyeol hasn’t thought about in years, something that he has come to take for granted in a world where almost everything is warmer than he is. But still, there’s a sense of relief in him that Baekhyun hadn’t avoided touching him for so long because he hated him, and a sense of guilt as well for faulting Baekhyun for it.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and presses his lips against Baekhyun’s hair. He’s sorry for many things – for not waking up to his senses sooner, for almost condemning Baekhyun to death, for not being human enough and warm enough that Baekhyun would never have been afraid to touch him.

“Stop.” Baekhyun leans back, and unexpectedly, his eyes are dry, though their rims are red. “I chose to touch you. And you’ve saved my life twice now. If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t be here today at all.”

“If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t have almost died at all,” Chanyeol corrects, and looks away.

Baekhyun presses his hands against Chanyeol’s cheeks and forces him to meet his gaze. “Baekbeom would have killed me if you hadn’t been there to stop him, and then the hunters would have killed Baekbeom and finished me off if I wasn’t dead already. I wouldn’t know the truth about this scar if it weren’t for you, and I wouldn’t...I wouldn’t know that my brother could still be alive. It’s because of you, Chanyeol, that I’m here today, and you can’t ever tell me you’re sorry for that again.”

Chanyeol is stunned speechless, even when Baekhyun leans in and presses a quick kiss to his lips.

Seeing Chanyeol’s expression, Baekhyun breaks into laughter. “Stop looking so scared, Chanyeol. I’m not going to hate you. For the longest time, I thought that Baekbeom killed my parents and ran away when the hunters arrived, leaving me on the brink of death. I never thought that he spared my life or cared about me at all. I hated him. But, because of you... well, I don’t know if I can forgive him just yet. But at least now I know the truth.”

Baekhyun links their hands together, his laughter softening into something more bitter. “You wanna know why I can’t sing in front of other people? You’re probably going to laugh at me, but when I was small, I was considered somewhat of a piano prodigy. I would play and play, not just because I was good at it, but because my family would always gather around me and listen and praise me when I did. Sometimes I would sing if my mom requested me to, and one day, my piano teacher found out. I went to this really prestigious music academy back then, and every year they hosted this talent show for all the upcoming and aspiring kids to show to the talent agencies and all that. So she urged me to sign up for it. I wasn’t going to, but my mom and my dad both looked so happy when they found out, so I did it. And – I remember being so incredibly nervous. I thought I was going to throw up on stage, but then I thought of my parents and Baekbeom coming to watch, and I would calm down again.

“But then I got on stage, and nobody was there. I couldn’t find them in the audience, and I just—I just froze. I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t even play the piano, let alone sing, and I was so angry and embarrassed and hurt that I just ran off stage and rode my bike all the way home. I remember thinking that I was going to run away, that I couldn’t show my face at school anymore, that I hated my parents and my brother for not showing up when I needed them most.” Chanyeol tightens his grip on Baekhyun’s fingers when he pauses, and Baekhyun squeezes back. “Well, you know the rest from there. After that, no matter when I tried to sing in front of someone else, I would always be brought back to that night, the anger and the fear and the utter clarity of thinking _‘I’m going to die right here.’_ You can imagine how surprised I was when I was able to sing in front of you. Or, well, maybe something in me deep down recognized you.”

He taps his fingers against Chanyeol’s wrist. “Don’t you think it’s incredible? The way we met so many times. That night, and then here, ten years later, with you producing my favorite music on top of that.”

If Chanyeol had a beating heart, it would’ve stumbled right there. As it is, he coughs a little, lowering his expression to hide his face. He’s sure his lovesickness is written clear as day across his eyes. “What happened to destiny being a ‘crock of shit’?”

“Hmm, did I say something like that before?”

Chanyeol growls before freeing his fingers from Baekhyun’s and lunging forward, targeting his sensitive sides. Baekhyun shrieks before writhing in his grasp, falling backwards and dragging Chanyeol with him. “Stop, stop! I give! Chanyeol!”

Chanyeol gives one last tickle before he collapses on top of Baekhyun. He presses his ear against Baekhyun’s chest, right above his heart, and feels it resound through him like the beat of a drum, solid, human, and alive.

He doesn’t tell Baekhyun, but he thinks it’s incredible too, so incredible that he sometimes doesn’t quite know if it’s the truth or if it’s just a dream he’s going to wake up from one day. He wants to believe it more than anything, wants to live in this little bubble forever with only him and Baekhyun inside.

He holds Baekhyun closer, feels his fingers curl into his hair, and tries not to think about the timer ticking down, down, down.

 

 

For a week, it feels like he truly is living in a dream.

Baekhyun presses closer than ever, all playful kisses that inevitably turn long and deep, much to the disgust of Jongdae the one time he passes them in the hall. Chanyeol asks Baekhyun on the roof a few days after if he’ll be willing to voice part of the vocals for the song he’s writing, and Baekhyun agrees. They don’t leave the roof until long after the sun’s gone down that day, hair and clothes mussed but not from the wind.

Even the vampire murders are only a small blip on his radar, though he knows he should be focusing more on them. He feels like there’s something he’s missing, sometimes, so obvious that it’s right under his nose, but when he looks at the corpses, he can’t place it. The only recent shift in pattern is that they’ve becoming more and more gruesome from the shoulders down, yet each and every corpse’s face is perfectly intact and serene in its rigor mortis.

But he doesn’t want to focus on that when Baekhyun is right here in front of him, beautiful and strong and alive.

This is what’s real, he tells himself. This is what’s important.

Only him and Baekhyun.

 

 

They’re lying on Baekhyun’s bed one night, protected from the outside world, a safe haven built by soft blankets and the warmth of skin against skin.

Baekhyun traces a finger against the Mark on Chanyeol’s skin, absently, and it tickles like the wings of a butterfly brushing against him.

“So you’ve turned someone before then?”

Chanyeol can’t help but tense slightly, and he nods. Baekhyun’s finger doesn’t stop moving in slow, lazy circles against the edges of the Mark, and he merely hums thoughtfully. “I was wondering why your Mark was silver. The ones we have now are all so red.”

“Newborns are like that,” Chanyeol explains softly. There’s no judgment in Baekhyun’s eyes, and he’s grateful for it, but he still feels the urge to continue, “It was completely consensual, when I turned Sehun.”

“I remember that name. You said he was in your coven with... Jongin?”

“Yeah. They’re both in America still now.”

Baekhyun finally drops his hand and leans completely onto Chanyeol instead, splaying over his bare chest and propping his head up with his arms. “Tell me about Sehun then.”

Chanyeol lifts his arms to hug Baekhyun closer, and he smiles slightly, thinking of when he first met Sehun. “He was a brat. He still is. It’s not much of a story, to be honest. Sehun was the byproduct of a... trade of sorts, and was unwanted by both sides. He begged me to spare his life, and I told him the only way I could do that was by turning him. He agreed, and, well, here we are now.” He leaves out the part where the trade was a human trafficking trade, coordinated by her and another vampire lord, and how the deal had gone sour when half the humans had turned out to be diseased. Infuriated, she had slaughtered them one a day in front of the entire coven, brutally ripping them apart limb by limb.

By coincidence, Chanyeol had been the one sent down to fetch Sehun the day of his death. All of the other humans had looked at him with fear and hatred in their eyes, but in Sehun’s there had only been the desperation to live, fierce and raw and animalistic. Perhaps it had been true compassion, or maybe – more likely – it had just been born of the burgeoning dissent in his heart against her, but he had hidden Sehun away and turned him. Unexpectedly, when she found out, she hadn’t been angry; instead, she had only smirked and said, so casually, “You’ll see, it’s so nice having a pet of your own.”

Even thinking back on it makes Chanyeol burn with anger. He’s brought back to the present when Baekhyun’s chin digs sharply into his chest as he speaks. “Do you have a ... a blood bond with Sehun then?”

“Huh?” Chanyeol’s so taken aback by the question that he takes a moment to place the source – oh right, he had mentioned the blood bond when he had talked about meeting Baekbeom, as well as the meaning behind the silver of his Mark. Still, the question is so absurd he can’t help but laugh a little. “No, we chose not to deepen it from the beginning. I can’t imagine having a blood bond with Sehun. I would feel hungry all the time. Jongin has it hard enough.”

“Jongin has a blood bond with him? Did Sehun...” Baekhyun trails off, frowning.

“No, Sehun hasn’t turned anyone.” Realizing Baekhyun only seems to be getting more and more confused, Chanyeol explains, “A blood bond doesn’t necessarily have to come from a turning. Of course, they can be shared between vampires, and they often are, for vampires who have chosen each other as partners. It makes everything more intimate, and a lot of the time, their relationship is one created directly through turning. But blood bonds can also exist between those who aren’t related by blood, as we say. In Sehun and Jongin’s case, they met in Seoul a few decades ago and just hit it off, and they’ve been blood bonded ever since.”

He still remembers when Sehun had first introduced him to Jongin, a stray vampire with no coven. He remembers how surprised he had been when Sehun, who had shown no inclination of caring about another vampire or human before then, suddenly showed up one day out of the blue with a bonded vampire in tow and requested for his protection.

“But they can be with humans too?”

“The blood bond? Yeah. It’s not as rare anymore as it used to be, especially in America. I saw a lot of vampires half-bonded to humans with no intention of turning them, yet, at least.”

Baekhyun has a strangely unreadable expression on his face, and he ducks his head into Chanyeol’s embrace when he mumbles so softly Chanyeol almost misses it, “Have you ever had one?”

“No. The closest I got was with Sehun, but even then it was never a true blood bond.” She had never bothered pursuing a blood bond with him. In the end, it makes sense. He had only been a plaything at best, and here she is now, determined to get him back like an impudent child who only knows how to stamp her feet and cry.

“How lucky,” he thinks he hears Baekhyun whisper.

For a second, he doesn’t process it. Lucky for who? Sehun? Why would Sehun be lucky?

Then, something snaps into place, and he smirks before dragging Baekhyun’s face up with his hands so he can see his eyes. “Are you _jealous_?”

Baekhyun’s eyes widen tellingly for the split second before he lowers his head and tries to wriggle out of Chanyeol’s grasp unsuccessfully, but his ears are bright red and they give him away. “No, why would I be jealous?”

“I think you’re jealous,” Chanyeol sing-songs, something soaring through his chest. Laughter bubbles through him again and he brushes a hand against the back of Baekhyun’s neck, causing him to flinch slightly.

“That’s playing dirty,” Baekhyun complains, finally giving up on escape and glaring balefully up at Chanyeol through his lashes.

“Well, do you want to form a blood bond with me? Would that make up for it?”

Chanyeol’s really just teasing, but when Baekhyun doesn’t immediately quip back with a witty response, he freezes too. Baekhyun looks at his expression for a long moment before moving his eyes away.

“Baekhyun—”

“I don’t know, okay! It kind of scares me, not because I’ll be connected to a vampire, but because I’ll be connected to _you_. And I’ve never been this close – ever – with someone else, and this is terrifying. But when I think about someone else being closer to you than I am, I...” Baekhyun takes in a trembling breath before smiling a little bitterly, rolling to the side. This time, Chanyeol lets him go. “I understand if you don’t want to be bonded to me. I’m just some human, anyway, and a hunter on top of that.”

Chanyeol stares at his back, bare but strong, hidden muscles rippling beneath pale skin, and he reaches out a hand to touch Baekhyun’s shoulder. “Baekhyun, look at me.” It takes a moment, but Baekhyun finally turns back. There’s something so wonderfully open in his eyes, and he stares at Chanyeol silently. “I’ve never been bonded to anyone before in my life, because I’ve never once found someone I felt I could reveal the deepest parts of myself to. But if I were to pick someone in this world, I would choose you. I would always, always choose you.”

His hand moves to trace Baekhyun’s scar on his shoulder, thumb rubbing against the slightly raised skin. Baekhyun shudders and closes his eyes. “You mean that?”

“Always,” Chanyeol promises again. “But – do you know exactly what you’re asking for, Baekhyun? My kind cannot truly bond with humans. It’s only a half-bond at best, and like with Baekbeom – that means that you will be bonded to me. I will be able to feel every single one of your emotions, every happiness and every sadness, unless one of us breaks the bond off. You would never be able to bond reciprocally with me unless I turn you. And I won’t ask that of you.”

Baekhyun wraps his arms around Chanyeol and tugs him so that he’s lying half-over Baekhyun, propped up on one elbow. He drags their lips together, softly, a press more than anything else, and when he speaks, the sensitive skin of his lips flutters against Chanyeol’s. “I think I wouldn’t mind being yours.”

At his words, something races through Chanyeol and touches the very core of him, the part that’s more beast than human, the part that snarls angrily when he sees his fake Mark and the part that purrs contently when he sees his real Mark on someone he cares about.

“You’re sure,” he says again, but his mouth is already dragging down to nip at the side of Baekhyun’s neck. He licks at the delicate skin there, feels the heartbeat racing beneath his tongue, out of nervousness or anticipation, he can’t tell. “Can I... here—”

“Yes, yes,” Baekhyun gasps, moaning when Chanyeol bites, gently, against his neck. “Show the world that I am yours.”

Everything goes into a haze after that. Between one nip and the next, Chanyeol feels his fangs slide out with an ease that leaves his mouth feeling comfortably full. He presses them against the thin skin of Baekhyun’s neck one last time, one last warning, one last chance for Baekhyun to step out even though Chanyeol’s eyes are already glowing red with need. In response, Baekhyun simply hugs him even closer, and Chanyeol bites down at long last.

It’s been so long since he’s drank from a live source – after weeks and weeks of stale blood bags – that when the first rush of sweetness fills his mouth, he can’t help but groan. It’s type O, his favorite, because of course Baekhyun would be perfect in every way, like he was made for Chanyeol and Chanyeol alone. He feels Baekhyun tremble beneath him, hands clawing against his back, as Chanyeol withdraws his fangs and let’s the blood flow into his mouth.

For a long, honeyed moment, Chanyeol lets himself simply enjoy it, enjoy the feeling of sheer warmth on his tongue, the knowledge that this is Baekhyun in his purest essence, giving himself over completely to Chanyeol.

Then he reaches out with his mind, gently, gently, for the last part of the blood bond. It’s not glamour, because he carries no intent with his touch, but still, when his mind finally meets Baekhyun’s, they both shudder. Euphoria, plain and simple, soars through them both – an incomparably delicious feeling, Baekhyun underneath him, Baekhyun inside him, Baekhyun all around him, Baekhyun Baekhyun _Baekhyun_.

 _Accept me_ , he tells him, pushing softly at the walls around his mind. _Let me in._

The walls stay up for a moment longer, before all of a sudden, they crumble beneath his touch like sand, and Chanyeol is surrounded by nothing but happiness, joy, disbelief, pleasure. Hidden beneath all that is something white and pure, vibrating and ducking when he gets close. It’s the same emotion that trembles through Chanyeol sometimes when he finds himself looking at Baekhyun, outlined against the sunshine or the white of his sheets, and wonders how he managed to deserve meeting this man not once, but twice in this life.

 _Me too_ , he wants to say, wants to show Baekhyun. But this is as far as they can go, without asking Baekhyun to change his life irrevocably for him, something he cannot and will not do.

He laps at the puncture wound, and they close automatically. He presses another open-mouthed kiss against his skin, and when he finally pulls back, he sees his own Mark – faintly red and glowing, nebulous and half-formed – pulsing against Baekhyun’s neck. Finally, finally, he’s mine, something deep inside him sings.

They stare at each other for a long moment, before Baekhyun breaks into a trembling smile. He places a hand on Chanyeol’s cheek, and wonder pours through the newly made, fledgling half-bond. “This heat. This is all me. I’m inside you.”

“I’m yours,” Chanyeol tells him, turning to press a kiss into Baekhyun’s palm. Embarrassment and giddy desire floods his mind.

“This is going to be so awkward,” Baekhyun mumbles, face aflame, but he doesn’t move to pull his hand away.

“Show me that feeling again.”

“Which one?”

“The glowing white one.” Chanyeol watches Baekhyun’s face flush an even darker pink, but he just nods, and tugs Chanyeol down against his chest.

The feeling quivers and shakes as it makes its way through the bond, as if one strong flame will just blow it out. It joins the radiance dancing in Chanyeol’s chest, and there he shields it, promises to build it up and keep it safe until it’s so strong that neither of them will ever have to be afraid of hurting each other again.

There they stay, cocooned by the warmth of the bond, huddled in the pure white light of their young love. And for one, blindingly happy moment, everything is perfect.

 

 

Something splinters, a fine hairline fissure, in their glass bubble.

 

 

It’s definitely different having a blood bond, even the half-formed one that exists between him and Baekhyun. He feels almost double of everything before they both learn what to tune down and filter out, though it makes for great intimacy for the first few days. Everything feels lighter, more effortless, and it’s as if he’s had the wrong prescription for his glasses for years and has only taken them off now. Fresh blood does make an incredible difference.

People notice. Of course they do, because Chanyeol’s Mark is placed in plain sight on Baekhyun’s neck, who does nothing to hide it. The edges of it are still blurry and indistinct, enough that anyone not intimately familiar with Chanyeol’s Mark would be unable to tell what shape it is. Still, the shifting redness of it gives away the nature of what it is, and Junmyeon does a double-take when he sees it for the first time. To his credit, he doesn’t say anything, and only nods appraisingly. But the same can’t be said for the rest of the hunter division, and for a while, the whispers that always follow them increase in magnitude, as well as the number of dirty looks. But Baekhyun seems truly unfazed, blank indifference leaking through the bond, and so Chanyeol does nothing.

The only moment he thinks with dead certainty, _I’ve been caught_ , is when Yixing sees Baekhyun for the first time after the creation of the bond. He stares hard at Baekhyun’s neck, brows furrowing, before he looks at Chanyeol uncertainly. But in the end, even he doesn’t comment, and merely wheels in the next victim.

They live in blissful ignorance, too wrapped up in the elation surrounding the newly formed bond to care about others. Baekhyun sometimes doesn’t even bother to speak anymore, just sends vague thoughts and snippets of feelings to Chanyeol when he’s bored or craving attention or wants something. Everything about Baekhyun is feather-light and crystal-clear, and he doesn’t hide anything from Chanyeol, because there’s nothing left that he hasn’t given him.

( _guilt, guilt, guilt_ )

Then, one night after a day of answering calls – another victim, still strangely mutilated below the shoulders but perfect from the neck up – and recording in the studio, Chanyeol notices something just slightly off.

Baekhyun is asleep on the couch, and even his dreams flicker through in transient shapes and colors through to Chanyeol. But that’s not what’s strange. Chanyeol frowns, stopping the tracks looping through his headphones for a moment, trying to pinpoint the feeling. It’s barely a prickle, nothing distinct, born more from the edges of his instincts than anything else. If he hadn’t been paying attention, he might’ve missed it or passed it off for something else entirely.

It takes a him a moment, but when he finally places it, he freezes.

It’s been years since he’s felt this, and it surprises him that he’s become so comfortable in this building that somewhere along the way, he’s started thinking of it as his territory. Not officially, of course, but merely subconsciously. It seems that that was enough to cause him to allocate some tiny portion of his mind to keeping track of the movement in the building, even while he’s awake.

Before, he hadn’t noticed, because only humans entered and left this building except for the few vampires they brought in for questioning that Baekhyun always told him about. But this, this—

This is an intruder.

He stands instinctively, bench scraping loudly back, and he’s at the door before he really realizes what he’s doing. Baekhyun shifts, then, on the couch, and lets out a sigh in his sleep. Chanyeol looks back and hesitates for a moment before shaking his head. No, he’s bonded to Baekhyun now. He’ll know if anything goes wrong.

The uneasy, prickling sensation only grows stronger as he ascends the floors, until he’s back on a floor he hasn’t been on in weeks. It grows and grows until he’s standing outside the door to his now seldom-used bedroom, and he knows who’s inside before he even opens it.

“Long time no see,” Kyungsoo greets him.

The other vampire is sitting on Chanyeol’s bed, tapping on his phone. He doesn’t even look up when Chanyeol enters and slams the door shut behind him.

“What are you doing here?” Chanyeol growls, clenching his fists. He stays near the door – guarding it, almost, in case Kyungsoo tries to get closer.

“Hey, no need to be so aggressive. We’re all friends here, aren’t we?” Kyungsoo pockets his phone and stands up, dressed in his usual outfit of slick black and leather. When Chanyeol doesn’t respond, he sighs. “Just chill out, I’m not here to do anything.”

Chanyeol doesn’t relax. “Then what are you here for? Her?”

“Don’t be like that. She misses you.” Kyungsoo smiles, but it looks just as blank as the rest of him.

“She wants to own me again,” Chanyeol corrects. “She’s bored.”

“Can you blame her? You were always her favorite.”

Chanyeol smirks viciously, and aims to cut, to slice, to tear when he says, “I remember when your brother was her favorite too.”

Finally, something furious flashes across Kyungsoo’s face, though he suppresses it quickly enough. His voice is ice cold. “And we all know what happened to my brother when he lost her favor. Don’t think you’re exempt from that, Park Chanyeol. We aren’t that special to her. Speaking of which, have you been appreciating the little gifts I’ve been leaving?”

“Excellent work,” Chanyeol says dryly. “But a little sloppy, especially recently.”

“You really haven’t noticed? You must be losing your edge, Chanyeol, or are you just too caught up with your little human pet to notice?”

“Baekhyun is not a pet,” he corrects automatically, hands balling into fists, before he hears the rest of Kyungsoo’s words. “What do you mean?”

“Hmm, I don’t know. Marks on the neck are pretty common, after all. It’s been a little bit harder to find a pretty face that matches, but not impossible.” Kyungsoo taps the side of his neck, exactly where Baekhyun bears Chanyeol’s Mark, and he stiffens.

( _He feels like there’s something he’s missing, sometimes, so obvious that it’s right under his nose, but when he looks at the corpses, he can’t place it—_ )

“How?” His voice is tight, and he can feel it, feel it all starting to crash down around him.

“You really thought you could hide it from her? She has eyes everywhere in this city. This is hers, long before you or me or any of these hunters came to play king. Of course she would know if you formed a half-bond with a human. She was absolutely livid, you know,” Kyungsoo crooks up the side of his lips. “Maybe you really are special.”

Chanyeol interrupts him, eyes ice cold. “What are you really here for, Kyungsoo?”

“I tried to warn you that she was going to do something if you didn’t come back. And you did – but not to her. To her, this is you playing hard to get. She thought it was amusing at first, but she’s losing her patience now. So this is me giving you your last warning. Stop this, Park Chanyeol, and come back before she does something you’ll regret for the rest of your life. If you truly care about your human, you’ll stop this farce now before both of you get involved any deeper.” Kyungsoo tosses something at Chanyeol, and he reaches out automatically to catch it. It’s his temporary phone, the one he hasn’t touched in weeks. It’s fully charged. “Call Sehun and Jongin back. Get your ID and leave. She’ll spare them still if you come back willingly.”

Chanyeol stares at the flimsy piece of plastic in his grip before he shoves it into the pocket of his jeans. Everything feels muddled and clear all at once, a decision he sees staring him in the face, one that he doesn’t want to have to make. Still, he tries, desperately, “You don’t think I can fend her off if she comes here?”

In response, Kyungsoo waves a gloved hand towards the open window where he had entered. “You would think that they would make this place a little harder to break into, especially since it’s their headquarters and all. What’s a little silver-enforced steel and engrained salt going to do against someone as old as us? A stake? Holy water? Please.” There’s almost pity in his expression when he looks at Chanyeol again. “How long do you think you can keep hiding? You think they won’t be able to recognize your Mark? She may think humans are all complete idiots, but you and I know they are not. Sooner or later someone is going to make the connection between your Mark and the ones on the corpses.”

Chanyeol remembers the way Yixing had looked between him and Baekhyun, and he knows it’s true. It’s just something he’s pushed down and down and down until it’s so deep that he doesn’t have to stare the ugliness of it in the face. He leans against the door heavily. “Why are you still here, Kyungsoo? Why don’t you just take your brother and run? Go far away enough and even she can’t find you.”

Kyungsoo laughs bitterly. “Don’t you think I wish I could? But what’s the use? Even if I take him now, he won’t wake up unless she wills it to happen. Here or halfway across the world, what’s the difference?”

“Did she promise you that she’ll wake him up if you get me to go back?” Kyungsoo jolts for a moment, but says nothing else. It’s enough. “You know you can’t trust her promises.”

One second, Kyungsoo is standing in front of him, and the next moment, he’s perched on the windowsill, balancing leanly like a cat. The cold autumn wind whips around him, but he doesn’t sway. “Just remember. This is my last warning, Park Chanyeol.”

Then he’s gone.

Chanyeol walks over and closes the window. He flexes his fingers, feeling the slight sting in them but nothing more. The silver and salt are so diluted that it’s basically ineffective against someone as old as him, and he knows Kyungsoo is right. Against her, it would be like a fly buzzing around an elephant, useless and insignificant.

Then he remembers the corpses, and he’s running, sprinting down the corridor, flying down the stairs until he’s pushing open the doors of the morgue. It’s dark, since it’s the middle of the night, but he slams on the lights with one hand and rushes over to the cold chambers where the corpses are kept. The silver is stronger here, but he ignores the pain and flings open the most recent one.

(— _the only recent shift in pattern is that they’ve becoming more and more gruesome from the shoulders down, yet each and every corpse’s face is perfectly intact and serene in its rigor mortis_ —)

Baekhyun’s face stares back at him.

For a second, he can’t get rid of the image superimposed across the corpse, and horror fills him before he shuts his eyes tightly and counts to ten. When he opens it again, the face is still that of an unknown vampire, but he doesn’t know how he missed it before. It’s unmistakably the same fine, pointed features that Baekhyun shares. Even the hair color is the same, and the haircut as well, silver splayed around the head in a mocking halo. The red of his false Mark is even more prominent against the paleness of the skin in death, and though Kyungsoo hadn’t bothered to recreate it in the likeness of the half-bond Mark, Chanyeol still doesn’t know how he’s missed it up until now. Even the build and height of the corpse is the same.

He slams the cold chamber shut and opens the next one, and the next one, and the next one. A good five or six of them share the same characteristics, almost beautiful in death from the shoulders up, Mark displayed prominently on the side of their neck, hair in varying shades of silver. It’s clearly been a pattern for a while now, just different enough that it would be unnoticeable by someone not looking for it, but now that he sees it, Chanyeol wants to throw up.

It’s worse than the disgust and rage from the impudence of imitating his Mark. It’s utter betrayal and sick revulsion. It’s a threat, clear and simple.

“Hey, what are you doing in here?”

An unfamiliar voice breaks through the silence, and startled, Chanyeol slams the last cold chamber shut and whirls around to see a hunter standing in the doorway of the morgue. He’s wearing the same clothes Yixing normally does, and he must be the one assigned for the night shift. His eyes are wary when he looks at Chanyeol. “Aren’t you that vampire who—hey!”

Chanyeol stalks past him without a word and doesn’t pause even when the hunter keeps shouting after him. But in the end, he isn’t stopped, and he makes it back to his studio before he finally halts, one hand on the door handle. He can feel Baekhyun inside, still asleep, peacefully unaware.

The phone burns a hole into his pocket, and his guilt burns a hole into him.

He leans his forehead against the wood for one long, long moment, before he finally straightens and turns back down the hallway.

“Hey, Sehun.”

 

 

Two days later, he and Baekhyun return from a call to an uproar of commotion.

A crowd of hunters have gathered in the open space of the lobby, muttering and gesturing to each other. They seem to be staring at something and pointing at something in front of them, but at the same time, they seem unwilling to get any closer.

Chanyeol draws in a deep gust of air and releases it, feeling his lungs inflate and deflate artificially with his exasperation.

“Dammit, Sehun, I told you not to come here,” Chanyeol mutters. Baekhyun looks, confused at him.

“Sehun?” he asks, but Chanyeol is already pushing through the crowd. They part for him when they realize who’s trying to get through, and at last, he sees Sehun and Jongin leaning against the desk, talking furiously to the terrified-looking receptionist.

Jongin notices him first, and his full lips break into a wide smile of genuine pleasure. “Hyung! It’s been so long!”

He gives Chanyeol a quick hug before turning to Sehun, who’s scowling impressively. It looks even more intimidating because of the sunglasses still shading his eyes, and Chanyeol plucks them off to his indignation. “Hey, give that back!”

“What did I tell you about coming here?” Chanyeol says instead, holding the sunglasses to the side when Sehun grabs for it.

“You can’t just tell me you’re staying in the freaking hunter _headquarters_ in Seoul and expect me to just sit tight and bide my time,” Sehun hisses, before grabbing Chanyeol’s arm and snatching his sunglasses back. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Now is not the time,” Chanyeol begins lowly, but he’s interrupted when Baekhyun says from behind him:

“Chanyeol?”

Sehun’s gaze snaps to Baekhyun, and his gaze flicks quickly over him before it lingers on the half-Mark on his neck. “Well, you certainly didn’t mention _this_. Now I see.”

“It’s not like that,” Chanyeol protests a little half-heartedly, but Sehun is already pushing past him and sauntering to a stop in front of Baekhyun, hands on his hips, all lanky lean height. To his credit, Baekhyun doesn’t flinch, merely stands straighter with a firm set to his mouth.

“So you’re Baekhyun?”

“So you’re Sehun?” Baekhyun mimics, crossing his arms. He looks so beautiful and self-assured, and the same glow thrills through Chanyeol. He can’t help the smile that breaks across his lips.

Sehun smirks and turns to Chanyeol, pointing a thumb at Baekhyun. “I like him. Good choice.”

The movement causes the scarf around his neck to slip down slightly, and his Mark slips into view, blood red. Baekhyun stares at it for a long moment before touching his own Mark and looking at Chanyeol. “Is this what yours looks like when it’s complete?”

Something jumps in Chanyeol’s chest for a second before he remembers that the Mark on Sehun’s neck isn’t his. “Ah—no. That’s—”

“That’s mine,” Jongin says, holding out his hand to Baekhyun, who shakes it gracefully. “I’m Jongin.”

“My blood partner,” Sehun adds, looping his arm through Jongin’s and leaning against him.

“You’re disgusting.”

“Well now you know how I feel when I see you with that gross smile on your face every time you look at Baekhyun.” His words are sharp, but there’s no venom in Sehun’s voice. Nonetheless, Chanyeol and Baekhyun both flinch slightly and look at each other, embarrassed.

Another voice breaks through the crowd, and Junmyeon finally arrives. “What’s happening here?”

They get things settled quickly enough. Sehun and Jongin both brought their – now expired – IDs, as well as Chanyeol’s, and Junmyeon takes them with a nod and promises to start the process of issuing the new ones in a few days. They’re placed in the rooms next to the bedroom Chanyeol was originally given, and then they’re left alone for privacy, as even Baekhyun leaves them with a nod and small smile towards Chanyeol.

It’s weird being separated this long from his coven, and he hadn’t anticipated the sense of relief when he sees them all safe in one place again. “Welcome back to Seoul.”

“Don’t remind me,” Sehun grimaces. “Speaking of which, what’s really up, Chanyeol? Stop trying to hide it. You’re a terrible liar.”

He really is, which is why he prefers telling an edited truth most of the time. But he’s never really been able to hide anything from Sehun. “She wants me to go back. Kyungsoo left me a note, which is why I came back here in the first place, and he warned me again a few nights ago.”

“The night you called us, huh,” Jongin says, and Chanyeol nods.

“I bet she’s not happy about Baekhyun.” Sehun dumps his bag onto the ground before flopping back onto the bed.

Chanyeol snorts and sits down next to him, feeling the bed dip under their weight. “To put it lightly.”

Sehun’s voice quiets when he says, “You can’t go back to her. She’ll destroy you, Chanyeol. She already almost did.”

“What if I have no choice?” he mumbles, staring at his feet, and Sehun sits up, frowning.

“What do you mean?” he starts, but then there’s a knock on their door.

Baekhyun peeks in. “There’s been another corpse, if you want to take a look.”

A few minutes later, when they’re all staring down at the thin, wan face – _Baekhyun, not Baekhyun, Baekhyun_ – and the glaring Mark on the side of the corpse’s neck, Sehun finally says, “Well shit.”

“Yeah,” Chanyeol agrees. “Well, shit.”

 

 

The glass bubble splinters, splinters, splinters, and widens into a crack in their subtle perfection.

 

 

The worst part is how easily Baekhyun fits in with their dynamic. He laughs at Jongin’s bad jokes and doesn’t get fed up with Sehun’s occasional childishness, and even joins them in lobbying against Chanyeol sometimes, much to his offense.

It’s such a blatant glimpse of what everything could be that maybe, maybe Chanyeol gets too caught up in waiting for the other shoe to fall, until it turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy, made of his own doing.

Sometimes, when he unconsciously grows distant, mind a million miles away, he comes back to himself to see Baekhyun watching him, silently. He can hear the unasked question through the bond, but he always turns away from it, and Baekhyun doesn’t push him.

There’s a lull of about a week after Sehun and Jongin arrives. A grace period, or the quiet before the storm, Chanyeol isn’t sure.

Either way, it doesn’t matter. When the hunter goes missing, he knows it’s all over.

It’s not anyone he or Baekhyun is close to, but nevertheless, when the absence is reported, he knows deep down what’s happened. Everyone has been on edge recently because of the still unsolved case of the vampire murders, and to have one of their hunters suddenly go missing – it’s panic. Patrols are sent out constantly, and Chanyeol knows then that he can’t keep putting it off any longer.

When he asks Sehun, he receives only silence.

“Please.”

“I don’t want to betray you,” Sehun says, clearly unwilling.

Chanyeol reaches out and ruffles Sehun’s hair, something the vampire detests. Sure enough, his lip curls and he knocks Chanyeol’s hand away on instinct. “You still owe me for saving your life, you know.”

“Seriously? I always knew you were the type to hold a grudge,” Sehun mutters, but above everything else – Sehun is unfailingly loyal, and Chanyeol knows he’ll keep his word when it comes down to it.

The night before the hunter’s corpse is found, he gathers Baekhyun in his arms and holds him close, savoring that blessed warmth one last time.

Baekhyun seems to sense that something isn’t quite right, or maybe he’s been able to tell all this time. He’s more perceptive than Chanyeol gives him credit for, after all, and he’s sorry that everything turned out this way – because of him, his mistakes, past and present. And he can’t involve Baekhyun any longer.

He almost crumbles when Baekhyun presses his lips into Chanyeol’s neck and whispers, “You know you can tell me anything, right?”

It’s the wrong moment entirely, and it’s not what Baekhyun is asking for, but all of a sudden he thinks that if he doesn’t tell him right now, if he leaves and never has a chance to tell him how much he means to Chanyeol, how much better his life has become since meeting Baekhyun – he’ll regret it forever. He needs to say _something_ , anything, but when he opens his mouth, Baekhyun silences him with a kiss.

“Chanyeol,” he says, but it’s a silent plea more than anything else. There’s hope and confusion radiating down the bond, and a lurking suspicion.

Chanyeol can only swallow it all down silently and hold Baekhyun even closer in a vain attempt to shield him from the storm that’s about to hit.

The next day, they find the body.

The Mark is bloody and fresh on his neck, but other than that, the corpse is unmarked. Even more than the previous victims, though, this is no longer a threat – this is a promise. A way of showing that even the hunters aren’t safe any longer, that if Chanyeol doesn’t do something now, he would be putting them all in danger.

The majority of the hunter division is gathered in the lobby when the body is brought back covered in a white sheet. The murmurs in the crowd swell when they see the tangible evidence that something is targeting them; understandable, considering that many of them are young and have only known the general peace of the time under Junmyeon. They don’t remember how this was commonplace just ten years ago, how hunters died easily with the flick of a hand if they irritated the wrong vampire. And this is her way of saying, _Look, Chanyeol, you think you’re so strong? I can make it happen again, and you can’t do a single thing to stop me._

Except he can.

Just one, but that one thing is enough.

“Commander, I think you owe us an explanation,” one of the hunters says as she steps forward from the crowd. Chanyeol vaguely recognizes her as the partner of the now deceased hunter, and he feels his heart twist as regret trickles through the bond.

Junmyeon looks exhausted, circles imprinted deep under his eyes, but he nods graciously and clears his throat before the mass of people. “I think so too. It’s not fair to keep you all in the dark. As some of you may know, in the past few months, we’ve been experiencing an unusual influx of vampire murders. At first, we weren’t sure what the relation was, but as more bodies began appearing, it was clear that they were correlated. We weren’t sure of the motive, so we were unsure of how to proceed, but now that they’ve targeted one of us, it’s obvious that we cannot continue to sit idly.”

“Correlated how?” someone else asks.

Junmyeon begins to answer, but he’s cut off when Sehun unexpectedly steps forward and lifts the sheet covering the body just slightly, enough to expose the scarlet mess of the Mark. “By this.”

Jongin, who’s standing near Chanyeol, frowns and shoots a look at him. “What—”

(— _it’s cracking, widening, splitting straight down the middle_ —)

“This is a Mark. But this isn’t just any Mark.” Sehun looks over the crowd at Chanyeol, and though he doesn’t share a blood bond with Sehun, he can feel his hesitation. It’s not too late, but at the same – it’s been too late for much too long now. He nods, and resolution sets in grimly in Sehun’s eyes.

It’s already almost winter in Seoul, and up till now, Sehun had been wearing only long sleeves and sweaters. Now, he grabs the hem of his sweatshirt, and pulls it off in one smooth moment, leaving only his thin T-shirt on underneath.

Chanyeol’s Mark stands out, bone-white and incriminating, on Sehun’s wrist, as he points at him.

“This is his Mark.”

(— _and it shatters._ )

For an endless moment, everything is pure silence.

Then the crowd erupts into noise, and everyone pushes away from him, leaving a wide circle of empty space, Jongin swept away too by them. The only one who doesn’t budge is Baekhyun, who had originally been standing directly in front of Chanyeol.

He’s almost afraid to reach out, but the bond is numb. Quiet.

Then Baekhyun turns, and the bond explodes in color.

Ashy disbelief, yellow-gold confusion, bruise-purple hurt, but underneath it all is still the calm blue of trust. He trusts Chanyeol, despite the evidence placed glaringly in front of him that Chanyeol might as well be the cause of the hunter’s death and all the vampires before that.

And it hurts to know that he’ll have to crush that trust, smash it into a thousand pieces until Baekhyun won’t ever look his way again, until he’ll be free from Chanyeol and all the harm he brings.

“Hold on,” Junmyeon is saying, struggling to push through the crowd to the two of them.

“The morgue is empty! All the other bodies are gone!” someone shouts from above the din, and when Chanyeol looks over, he sees the same hunter who had caught him the other night. He looks bitter and self-satisfied when he meets Chanyeol’s gaze, and he thinks, _that’s how she knew_. But it’s too late.

“I bet he took the bodies to try to hide the evidence!”

“I can’t believe he’s been walking among us for this long—”

“He killed someone—”

“—I bet Baekhyun is working with him—”

Hearing that, Chanyeol can’t stand it any longer. “Baekhyun has nothing to do with this!” he shouts above the crowd. Instantly, everyone quiets, and Baekhyun stares at him with wide eyes. He’s sorry, so, so sorry, but there’s no other way, and so he smiles cruelly and says, “You think he was that important to me? You think this means anything?” He gestures to the blood bond Mark. “I was bored. That’s all. And Baekhyun was just such an easy target. You know, planting a memory is just like planting a seed. Some heartfelt words, a glamour or two, and you’ll never know what was real or not. Did you really think I met this brother of yours?”

He reaches out, and finally, Baekhyun flinches away and steps back. Chanyeol feels triumph and guilt mix bitterly in his chest. Hurt pours through the bond, overpowering and raw, and the trust drowns slowly under the onslaught of red.

“I don’t believe you,” he whispers, touching the Mark on his neck. “You wouldn’t—Baekbeom—”

“Was that his name? I caught it once in your sleep, and I just ran with it. I never thought I was actually right.” Chanyeol laughs, loud and fake. “Got lucky, I guess.”

At least now, the attention will be diverted off of Baekhyun, and no one will suspect him. They’ll think he was a victim of brainwashing, of a cruel vampire who came in to play with them at his whims just because he could.

“It’s just a pity all those vampires kept trying to get close while I was having so much fun here. I told them they couldn’t stay near me once they were turned, but they just kept insisting that they wanted to spend an eternity with me. And how could I deny that?” Chanyeol shrugs, drawing from the cool indifference he had spent centuries watching the traditionalist vampires wear around them like an impenetrable, arrogant cloak. “The hunter, well, he didn’t mind his own business. Bad things happen to children who don’t listen.” He grins, fangs in full view, and hears the shock ripple through the crowd.

His chest is throbbing. Baekhyun bites his lip, hard, but he doesn’t cry. Firm, resolute Baekhyun to the very end. Chanyeol wants to smile, but it’s agonizing.

“It’s all a game to him,” Sehun says, stepping forward. His eyes are impassive. “If he likes you, he’ll turn you. If not, he’ll toy with you and let you think that he cares, and then...well, you saw what happened with all the other vampires.” It sounds awfully like what her favorite pastime is, Chanyeol thinks. How ironic. In the end, he’ll be remembered as no better than she is.

Baekhyun looks back at Chanyeol, one last desperate attempt, one last plead for him to prove him wrong.

Chanyeol looks him dead in the eyes, and says lightly, “What a pity. You would’ve made such a lovely vampire, Byun Baekhyun.”

The betrayal and distress rips through him like a tsunami, swelling and swelling until he thinks it’s going to explode out of him, until surely Baekhyun will break down and collapse—

Then, like the snap of a switch, everything stops.

It hurts more than he had imagined, the breaking of a bond. It’s as if part of him as been scooped away and hollowed out, and everything that’s left behind is just a sort of numb emptiness. The silence in his mind has never felt more deafening.

His Mark on Baekhyun’s neck pulses feebly one more time, before it too fades back to a pale white.

He turns and pushes through the crowd.

Chanyeol lets him go.

“Park Chanyeol, you’re under arrest until further investigation,” Junmyeon is saying, but it sounds far away, like he’s submerged underwater and everything is reach him in slow, muffled waves, as he watches Baekhyun’s figure disappear down the hallway.

This is what he wanted, what he orchestrated to happen.

So why does it feel so empty?

 

 

Although Baekhyun had jokingly said that they didn’t have dungeons anymore at the headquarters, the holding cells aren’t much different.

Everything is damp and smells faintly of mold, and the cot that Chanyeol sits on is uncomfortable and hard. Still, it’s better than being executed immediately on the spot, so he sits there and stares at the handcuffs on his wrists, a mocking throwback to the first day he landed in Korea. He never would’ve thought that he would end up here, like this, now.

There’s a slam of a door, and then footsteps echo down the tile of the hallway. He looks up to see Junmyeon standing outside his cell, a tired expression etched into his face.

When he doesn’t speak first, Chanyeol pulls the corner of his mouth up in a false smile. “Not so much the hero you thought I was, huh?”

“Is there someone blackmailing you?”

Out of all the things Junmyeon could say, that’s the last thing that Chanyeol had been expecting, and he’s too stunned to respond immediately. When he finally does, all he says is, “What makes you think that?”

“Before the bodies were stolen, Yixing had been examining the Marks closely. He mentioned that there was something weird about them, as if they weren’t all perfectly the same. But before he could go any further – well, today happened.” Junmyeon wraps one of his hands around the bars to the cell. “I don’t think you did this.”

“You don’t _know_ me,” Chanyeol explodes, standing in a burst of movement. He’s sick of this trust he doesn’t deserve, when all he’s done is betray and hurt and make people fall apart. “Kim Junmyeon, do you know how old I am? You think I’m a century old. What if I told you my age was five times that? What if I told you I could crush you with a single thought without having to touch you? What if I told you that your entire legacy could be dismantled by one vampire because of a grudge—”

— _that she holds against me_.

He stops himself just in time and sits back down heavily on the cot. “Just go away. I promise I’ll disappear forever, and this will never happen again.”

“Tell me who it is, Chanyeol. You don’t have to do this alone.”

He barks out a laugh, harsh and cold. “You don’t understand. If I don’t do this alone, she’ll destroy all of you along with me. I can’t risk...” He doesn’t deserve to say he can’t risk Baekhyun’s life, not after what he did to him, but he still believes it nonetheless.

“This doesn’t have to be your own burden,” Junmyeon says. When Chanyeol doesn’t respond, he sighs and says, “Think about it,” before he leaves.

But he’s already thought about it. He’s thought about it for a long time now, and he knows that this is all he could’ve done, after everything he didn’t do when he should’ve.

That night, Sehun comes, and Chanyeol is ready.

Before he unlocks the door to the cell, though, Sehun just stands there, keys dangling around his finger.

“What’s with everyone standing there and staring at me today?” Chanyeol rolls his eyes and reaches between the bars for the keys. Sehun takes a step back, just out of reach. “Hey, you better not be getting second thoughts. We agreed to this.”

“You think that made it any easier to do what I did earlier today?” Sehun’s lips twist. He’s unhappy.

“Now you’re upset? You and I know the truth. I’m sure you told Jongin by now. Those are the only people who matter.”

“And you think this is fair to Baekhyun?”

Chanyeol pauses, and lowers his arm slowly. He stares coldly at Sehun. “I think Baekhyun’s life is more important than what he thinks of me.”

“You’re a fucking idiot sometimes, Park Chanyeol,” Sehun mutters viciously, before he jams the key into the door and clicks it open.

“Don’t worry. You won’t have to worry about me for much longer.” Chanyeol steps out and holds out his wrists, and Sehun unlocks the handcuffs too.

“Will you even be able to do it? You know how hard it is to kill your own mentor.”

He can’t think about that possibility – the very likely chance he’ll fail. “If I can’t kill her, promise me. You’ll take Baekhyun and Jongin and go. She can’t reach you in America.”

“This doesn’t have to end like this.”

Chanyeol smiles and ruffles Sehun’s hair one last time. “I started this. So it’s only fair I’m the one to finish it. And you know as well as I do if I don’t make them all hate me, she would never let them go.”

“You don’t regret it?”

Halfway down the hall, Chanyeol pauses. The silence in his head is deafening.

“Oh, I regret it more than you’ll ever know.”

But at the same time, this is the only way to keep Baekhyun safe forever. And if this is the price he has to pay for that, then so be it.

The night wind slashes into his cheeks as he leaps through the window Sehun had left open in the hallway outside the holding cells. It’s on the ground level, thankfully, not that it would have deterred him much even if it wasn’t, but this way it’s easier to escape without the commotion.

Kyungsoo is waiting for him on a sleek black motorcycle. He cocks his head when Chanyeol approaches. “Took you long enough.”

“What, no helmet?” Chanyeol straddles the back of the bike, and Kyungsoo revs the engine.

“Oh please,” he says, and pulls onto the road before shooting forward in a burst of speed. Chanyeol’s forced to wrap his arms around his waist or risk falling off entirely. “It’s not as if we’d die anyway.”

“Too bad,” Chanyeol mutters, but Kyungsoo still hears it and laughs.

The sound vibrates through him, but there’s none of the familiar warmth, just the frozen wind as it slices through his hair, the cold light of the moon far above, and the eerie, empty stillness in his head.

 

 

They drive until they’re about half an hour outside Seoul, deep in exactly the type of lonely, desolate forest that she had always favored. It’s not the same place that Chanyeol remembers leaving from ten years ago, but that’s not surprising, considering the handover of territory from vampires to hunters.

Kyungsoo parks outside of what looks like a small, rectangular concrete bunker. The forest is completely silent around them, as if even the animals know that this is not somewhere safe to stay. Their footsteps seem unbearably loud as they step over the undergrowth and approach the door of the bunker.

Kyungsoo places his hand on the electronic pad next to the steel-enforced door, and it whirrs for a second before flashing green. The door rumbles open slowly.

“Keeping up with the times, huh?” Chanyeol follows Kyungsoo into a completely empty room, all concrete walls and floor. An elevator stands in the middle of the room, black and boxy. Behind them, the door slams shut with a final-sounding thud.

“Just precautions,” Kyungsoo answers, smiling before tugging up his sleeve to reveal his Mark – her Mark. He flashes it against the pad located next to the elevator, and the doors slide open silently to reveal a gleaming, metallic interior.

The ride down seems to last both seconds and an eternity at the same time. Either way, Chanyeol doesn’t think he’ll ever be prepared for this moment.

Im Jinah is just as beautiful as he remembers from the very first time he saw her, a glimpse of cold, unnatural beauty between the gaps of her veil as she rode down the street on horseback, far away and untouchable like the moon. Now, five hundred years later, she doesn’t look as if she’s aged a single day – because she hasn’t. The only difference is that Chanyeol no longer looks at her with those rose-tinted glasses, and without them, he can see the true ugliness hiding beneath her beautiful exterior.

“Chanyeol, you’ve returned.” She smiles wide, lips red as blood, and spreads her arms like she expects Chanyeol to jump into them. Kyungsoo nudges his back, and he stumbles more than steps out of the elevator. “Wonderfully done, Kyungsoo. I knew I could count on you.”

“You’ll keep your promise,” Kyungsoo says stonily. “I want my brother back.”

“Of course, of course.” Jinah waves her hand airily. “Why so impatient? We have all the time in the world.”

Chanyeol remembers saying almost the same exact thing in a room far more comfortable than this sterile, blank underground hideout, even with the handcuffs around his wrist and faced with the prospect of thirst-frenzy. It feels like a lifetime ago, and once, Chanyeol would’ve believed it. But now – time has stopped for him, yes, but it will never start again, an endless future that has never seemed bleaker.

Once it was bright, filled with warmth and the laughter of someone he loved.

Now, all he can see is the end.

“You—”

“Kyungsoo.” With one word, she silences him, though that same cheerful smile is still pasted on her lips. “Don’t be so impolite. I haven’t seen Chanyeol in so, so long, and you insist on bringing up such insolent, boring topics? Haven’t I taught you better than this?”

Chanyeol can see Kyungsoo’s jaw flex as he clenches his teeth, but he merely nods stiffly. Jinah’s voice had carried no glamour with it, but in the end, this is Im Jinah – she doesn’t need glamour to bend the minds of humans and vampires alike to her whim.

“Now, be a good boy and leave us alone for a while. I’ll come to you later.” She reaches out and strokes Kyungsoo’s cheek with the back of her slim fingers. Her nails look like claws, tipped with a red the same colors as her lips. Kyungsoo glances at Chanyeol before bowing slightly to her and disappearing down a hallway to their right.

“Where were we? Oh yes. This is no place to entertain company, my apologies. Come.” As always, everything she says is a suggestion disguised as an order, a threat disguised as a promise. Sweet words with venom lurking underneath, the poisonous bite of a seemingly harmless snake. Her hair is loose and long, swaying down her back as she walks down a hallway opposite of the one Kyungsoo had turned into. The corridors are maze-like, winding and twisting, as expected of her paranoia, and Chanyeol nearly loses track of where he is several times.

Finally, she stops in front of a series of ornately carved doors, set into the same concrete walls wrapping around the rest of the hideout. They swing open with her touch effortlessly, but Chanyeol knows that if he were to try and open it himself, he would have to expend much of his energy unless she willed it open. It makes his skin crawl, knowing that every inch of this hideout is marked unmistakably as _hers_ , stained in her glamour and her power. The Mark on his arm burns as the doors close behind him.

The room he’s in is all black and dark red, filled with the long drapes that she’s always been fond of. It’s overly elaborate in the way that Jinah herself is, fancy exported rugs and skins layering over the floor. A sprawling king-size bed takes over the center of the room, the blankets deceptively mussed. Jinah would never sleep – deep or light sleep. She’s much too proud, too certain of her own place in the world, and too insecure all at once to submit herself to the dark comfort of sleep. Like everything, this is just another carefully planned façade.

She glides more than walks over to the tastefully minimalistic fridge set into the bedside table and pulls out what looks like a wine bottle. When she uncorks it, however, the distinctive scent of blood wafts into the room. Type O, and Chanyeol’s stomach churns. She splashes the liquid into two crystal wine glasses and holds one out to Chanyeol.

“Your favorite. Freshly drained this morning,” she chirps sweetly, lips curved. “None of that nasty, chemicalized blood they try to poison us with in those cursed blood banks.”

Chanyeol takes the glass but doesn’t drink from it. His fingers feel stiff and numb where they curl, almost too tight, around the thin stem. “Jinah.”

She ignores him and takes a long sip from the glass. “Ah. Now this – this is what we deserve. Of course, it’s not as good as fresh blood from the source, but come now, sometimes we have to be a little classy.”

“Jinah,” he repeats, and layers a bit of glamour into his voice this time, because he knows she won’t take him seriously unless he proves it.

Sure enough, she tilts a surprised eyebrow at him. “Oh ho, what’s this? Upset about something, are we?” She drains the rest of the glass before setting it on the bedside table, licking her lips. They’re stained even darker now. “Could it be you’re disappointed I took away your little toy?”

The blood sloshes dangerously in the glass as his hand shakes. “Don’t.”

“Even I thought it was a bit of a pity. He’s such a pretty one. I knew your taste would be good, Chanyeol,” Jinah purrs, slinking closer to him. “Was his blood so delicious that you didn’t want to give him up? What was his name again? Baekhyun?”

“You don’t have the right to say his name,” Chanyeol snarls before he can help himself. Baekhyun’s name sounds so wrong coming from her mouth, a light that doesn’t belong in such tainted darkness.

Jinah pouts at him. “Don’t be so mean, we haven’t seen each other in so long and you’re like this right away? That’s no fun. Or is it the silence in your head that’s getting to you? Breaking a bond can be tough, I know, but it’s better than being bonded to something so filthy—”

The wine glass tumbles from Chanyeol’s hand and falls onto the rugs below with a small thump, the blood soaking out into a damp puddle. Jinah’s hair fans out beneath her like ripples of black silk against the red of her bedsheets, and she smiles viciously as Chanyeol’s hands tighten around her neck.

All he has to do is twist, and her head will come flying off.

“What, you’re not going to do it?” she asks innocently, blinking, when he doesn’t move. “How disappointing.”

“Why?” She’s warm under his fingers, perpetually warm because of how much blood she consumes everyday. That, like everything else, hasn’t changed.

“Why what? Why did I do it?” Jinah sighs, her throat flexing under his grip. Her eyes turn mournful. “I missed you, Chanyeol. I was bored. These ten years without you were just so _uninteresting_ , you know? How could you leave me like that after everything I’ve done for you? Don’t you know how much I love you? There’s no one else I would rather have by my side forever, and you would leave me for some human who’ll die in less than a century?” She’s so sincere that for a split second, despite knowing her true nature, Chanyeol almost believes her. Then she grins, sharp and cutting. “Is that what you wanted to hear?”

For a long moment, all Chanyeol can feel is regret and sadness. He’s not quite sure how it’s come to this – even five hundred years later, he still remembers the rare moments of tenderness Jinah had shown after he had first been turned, and the compassion she didn’t need to fake for the sake of putting on a show. He’s not quite sure when that kindness had turned into this bitterness, when what was inside had begun to twist and twist until it turned her into the monster she is now. Some of his thoughts must show on his face, because her grin turns into a scowl lightning fast.

“When did you become so soft? I didn’t raise you to become like this.”

“I would rather be like this than be like you, filled with hatred,” he says softly. “They did nothing wrong. Why do you hate them so much?”

“Nothing wrong? They took _everything_ from me, Chanyeol. Everything I ever had, everything I could ever give them, they took it from me. They used me for the sake of reaching eternal life and then abandoned me as soon as I gave it to them. But all along, you stayed by my side, so it was okay. Then – then they took you too, corrupting your mind with sympathy for their kind. That human stole you, poisoned you. You’re not his. You’re _mine_.”

Chanyeol shakes his head slowly. “You don’t own me, Jinah.”

“Then prove it. Kill me,” she hisses, baring her fangs, and tilts her head back to give Chanyeol better access.

All he has to do is twist.

His hands tighten.

Im Jinah will die, vanish forever. His mentor, the oldest vampire he knows, the biggest threat to Baekhyun. She will die, and they will all be safe. He can go back to Baekhyun, and even if his apologies aren’t accepted, he can live knowing that no further harm will come to Baekhyun ever again.

All he has to do is twist.

He can’t do it.

Chanyeol sees triumph flash cold and victorious across her eyes before the world spins and he’s the one lying on the bed. One of Jinah’s hands is pressed against his shoulder, an immoveable weight, while the other’s palm is pressed against his forehead. He remembers Kyungsoo’s brother lying immobilized on that stone table, eyes wide and terrified, Jinah’s hands in this very position, before he had been put into a sleep so deep that even now, he does not wake.

Pure fear drops straight through him.

“You’re mine, Park Chanyeol. This is where you belong, here by my side.” She leans in close over him, hair falling around them like a curtain, until they’re just scant centimeters apart. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to do it. Your conviction isn’t strong enough. You still need me.”

All he can do is whisper, “Please.”

“Please don’t do it? I’m afraid I can’t do that. As much as it pains me to part with you so soon after we just crossed paths again, bad boys have to be punished. And you’ve been very bad. Trying to kill your own sire? That’s a big no-no.” Her thumb strokes against his hairline tauntingly, and his skin crawls. “Don’t worry. It’ll be painless and quick, and you’ll be awake again before you know it. We have so much to catch up about, after all. We’ll just be separated for, hm, well, eighty years or so? That should be more than enough time for that pesky human of yours to expire.”

Baekhyun.

All of a sudden, the regret and the utter loneliness he’s been suppressing catch up to him at once, a tidal wave of memories and emotions that leave him drowning. He’ll never see Baekhyun again. This is something he had accepted – or at least he thought he had – but suddenly, tilting on the brink of it, staring at the abyss yawning beneath his feet, the reality of what he’ll be losing overwhelms him.

The flash of that silver hair in the orange glow of the sunset, the serenity of those delicate features painted rosy and soft by the sun. The firmness of his hands, the slenderness of his fingertips, the warmth of his skin. The strength coiled in his lithe body, the confidence with which he held his stake, the openness of his eyes when he gave Chanyeol everything. The moles Chanyeol had loved to count late at night, dots of tiny black against his pale skin like constellations in the sky. The way his voice had trembled when he sang for Chanyeol the first time, and the fearlessness when he had sang for Chanyeol for the last time. The Mark he had displayed openly on his neck, unafraid and proud. The curling white of that glowing feeling nestling deep in their chests, the utter intimacy of being connected to someone else so entirely that their emotions melded and became one.

Baekhyun, who can be reckless and prickly and defensive. Baekhyun, who can be daring and selfless and unapologetically fierce. Baekhyun, who’s warm and soft and pretends not to care. Baekhyun, who owes his life to Chanyeol but never carried his head any lower because of it. Baekhyun, who is Chanyeol’s equal in every way.

Baekhyun, who he should’ve trusted more. Baekhyun, who he wronged.

Baekhyun, who Chanyeol loves.

Baekhyun, who loved Chanyeol.

Baekhyun.

“Sweet dreams, Chanyeol,” Jinah says, and for the first time in five hundred years, the world goes pitch black and silent around him, no flickering lights, no dancing colors.

Just – nothing.

And Chanyeol sleeps.

 

 

 

.

 

..

 

...

 

....

 

.....

 

......

 

He expects deep sleep to be just as Jinah described – the jumping of time like the skip of a stone over water, one moment to the next with effortless ease.

He doesn’t expect the dreams.

At least, it feels like he’s dreaming again, shuffled somewhere deep in the corner of his mind. Everything is vague and shapeless around him, and as soon as he gets close to grasping onto something, it slips away between his fingers like grains of sand.

First is the probing confusion and unsureness, tentative and so small that he almost misses it entirely. By the time he’s aware of something out of place, it’s already gone, replaced with an anger that burns bright and furious like a flame and a fierce protectiveness. Underneath it all is the undercurrent of a deep sadness and guilt, and it’s so similar to what he had been feeling before he betrayed – betrayed someone, who again? – that he just assumes he’s replaying the most vivid memories of before he was forced into deep sleep.

The darkness grabs at him with sticky fingers. It wants to drag him down, deeper and deeper, until he’s smothered entirely. He almost wants to let it – he’s so tired, exhausted down to his very bones. Wouldn’t it be nice to sleep, just a little? Can’t he have that much?

But no. Something isn’t quite right – he’s forgetting something, something incredibly important. Something – no, some _one_. Who—

_I hate you._

The voice fades almost as soon as he hears it, too quick for him to discern who said it. His thoughts are a disorganized mess, but he thinks he understands that he deserves it, that whoever hates him has a full right to. He’s hurt them, he’s hurt so many people. He deserves to be put to sleep.

_How could you do this to me?_

He’s sorry, he’s so sorry, but when he opens his mouth, nothing but more darkness pours in.

Then everything goes quiet again, and he isn’t sure whether the thin thread of determination whirling bright blue and electric is just another illusion. It twists and turns around him for a long time, never fading, but even that isn’t enough to save him from sinking and sinking.

 

.......

 

........

 

.........

 

Pain is a starburst of orange, so shocking and loud that it chases away some of the blackness with its neon flare. Following it is pure fury, a rage so strong that it shakes him to the very core with its righteous wrath. There’s a bloom of self-satisfied vengeance before that too disappears in the fireworks of pain.

He isn’t too sure this is a dream anymore, but the darkness still tangles itself around him, heavy and shackling. He tries to fight it, but he’s too weak, he’s always too weak, that’s why he couldn’t protect—

_Wake up!_

The voice sounds far away, but then it repeats itself again and again, clearer each time.

I’m trying, he wants to shout back, but his voice is muffled and lost in the void. The pain increases, and this time, fear trickles in like black ink in water, blossoming across everything else.

_Stop sleeping!_

He has to wake up. If he doesn’t, something terrible will happen. The fear is spreading, staining everything, and he has to wake up right now – he has to wake up for—

_Chanyeol!_

The voice is startlingly clear, and it cleaves through the darkness in a slice of white light, redemption and love and trust and confidence and—

 

........

 

.......

 

......

 

.....

 

....

 

...

 

..

 

.

 

Baekhyun.

Before the last dredges of darkness fully leave him, Chanyeol’s body is already moving on instinct. By the time he’s fully conscious, he’s staring down at Jinah’s shocked face, and one of his hands is buried through her stomach, the other clenched so tight around her neck that he can see the marks begin to form.

“How—”

At the same time, he hears the thread of a familiar voice, thin and breathless.

“Chanyeol?”

Chanyeol looks to the side to see Baekhyun crumpled on his knees, eyes wide, one arm dangling uselessly at his side. He’s hunched over his stomach, one hand pressed to the side of his neck. Blood trickles over the edges of his fingers, and Chanyeol’s eyes flash fire red before he turns slowly to look back at Jinah. Everything sharpens and becomes crystal clear.

He knows Jinah sees it as well, because she lashes out at him with her mind, panic written clear in her uncontrolled attack. But with the bond buffering him, it merely bounces off harmlessly, and his fingers dig deeper. He twists his hand deeper in her stomach and she gasps.

“You,” she says, mouth opening and closing as if she can’t find the right words. “You can’t.”

“I can, and I will,” Chanyeol says completely calmly. He rips his hand out and brings it to join his other hand at her throat, the blood sliding slickly over their skin where he presses down. “Im Jinah. I, Park Chanyeol, hereby reject you as my mentor and blood parent. I am no longer yours in any way, shape, and form, nor are you mine. Upon this I swear.”

All he has to do is twist.

He does it.

On his left arm, the Mark he had borne first with pride, then with apprehension, and finally with disgust, darkens from its quicksilver sheen until it fades into the absolute oblivion of a beautiful iridescent black.

 

 

Im Jinah was beautiful in her humanity and even more beautiful in her immortality, but in death, all things are equal, and she is no exception. Time is a cruel master, even more so to the ones who evade it, and Chanyeol and Baekhyun both watch silently as her body first caves to bone and skin before scattering into a dust that permeates the rugs below.

Relief explodes through the bond, but before Baekhyun can say anything, Chanyeol feels the world whirl around him again, and everything fades out in a dazzle of white.

It’s not the oppressive darkness of deep sleep, merely the familiar flickering consciousness associated with light sleep. Chanyeol can’t help it – it’s his body’s way of shutting down after being forcibly pulled out of deep sleep, something he’s never heard of another vampire doing. Most vampires wake on their own time, but then again, most vampires are also not forced into deep sleep by their mentor as punishment.

Still, the bond stays with him, and he’s cognizant enough this time around to recognize it as what it is and not as a dream. Baekhyun’s presence is a steady constant by his side, comforting even despite the anxiety and worry permeating his sleep.

He wakes up three days later in his bed back at the hunter headquarters. Baekhyun is curled up next to him, fast asleep, and his hand is only a breath away from Chanyeol’s, as if he had wanted to hold it but at the last minute hadn’t found the courage to. For a moment, all Chanyeol can do is stare at him and wonder if the past few weeks have been nothing but a waking nightmare, so accustomed he is to the sight of waking up next to Baekhyun like this. But then he raises his arm and catches a glimpse of Jinah’s Mark, black as night, and knows that this – this is his reality now, a destiny of their own making.

His hand settles feather-light against Baekhyun’s cheek, but Baekhyun wakes up instantly, eyes flying open. There’s a second where all they can do is stare at each other, side by side, joined by Chanyeol’s touch, before Baekhyun throws himself at Chanyeol and kisses the life out of him.

“I hate you,” he declares when they separate because Baekhyun still has to breathe.

Chanyeol, who doesn’t have to breathe, doesn’t feel any less breathless. His lips tingle, and his fingers are tangled in Baekhyun’s soft hair. “Is that really the first thing you’re going to say to me?”

“You could’ve just _told_ me. Everything. The Marks, the reason behind the murders, your mentor. I wouldn’t have pushed you away.”

Chanyeol knows that now, and it’ll be forever one of his biggest regrets. But back then, he had been so overwhelmed by everything else – the intensity of his love for Baekhyun, the staggering wrongness of the fake Marks, the precious novelty of their fledgling bond – that he hadn’t really thought anything through and had hurt the both of them because of that. He traces the bandage tied tightly around Baekhyun’s neck. In the end, Jinah had scarred them both.

“You know, I got her good before you woke up,” Baekhyun says so abruptly that Chanyeol bursts out laughing. “What? I really did! She clearly didn’t expect that ‘puny, weakling of a human’ to stab her in the arm with a silver stake. Then you woke up, which was nice and all, but I could’ve totally handled it. Hey, stop laughing.”

“I believe you, I believe you,” Chanyeol says between chuckles. Baekhyun grabs both of his cheeks with two tight pinches. “Ow, stop! I said I believe you!”

“I don’t trust you,” Baekhyun declares.

Chanyeol stops laughing then, reaches up to trap Baekhyun’s hands against his cheeks, and tells him what he should’ve told him since the very beginning. “Well, I trust you.”

Baekhyun stares at him for a long, long moment, before he suddenly ducks his head into Chanyeol’s neck, his hands falling to clutch at Chanyeol’s shoulders. His entire body trembles, just slightly, and something damp soaks into Chanyeol’s skin. Chanyeol doesn’t say anything, just holds Baekhyun even tighter.

Finally, Baekhyun mumbles shakily, “I was lying about not trusting you.”

“I know.”

“About hating you too.”

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“I know.”

“Is that really what you should be saying right now?” Baekhyun sputters, clambering up. He lets out a yelp when Chanyeol tightens his grip and forces him back down, face still pressed against his neck.

He shuts his eyes against the warmth welling up in his own eyes and concentrates on the glow vibrating through their bond instead, vibrant and strong and so, so beautiful.

“I love you too,” he whispers into Baekhyun’s hair, and he feels his smile curve against his skin.

He’s finally found where he belongs for the rest of his eternity.

 

 

It turns out he has more to thank Kyungsoo for than he had given him credit for.

After Jinah had forced him into sleep, Kyungsoo had ridden all the way back the headquarters and walked in hands up, allowing himself to be arrested for the sake of talking to Junmyeon, Baekhyun, Sehun and Jongin. He had explained everything, from the disfigurement of the Marks to the hold Jinah had over both of them to the deceit Chanyeol had pulled off in order to force Baekhyun to let him go. Baekhyun hadn’t believed him at first until Sehun had confessed his own lies under Chanyeol’s request, vouched for by Jongin and Junmyeon. Upon hearing that Jinah had forced him into deep sleep, Baekhyun had personally organized a force to come rescue Chanyeol, despite knowing that it would be a suicide mission more likely than not.

Luckily, Baekhyun hadn’t actually broken off the bond at the moment Chanyeol had thought he did, merely thrown up a wall so thick and impenetrable that it might’ve just as well been a severed bond. As a result, his emotions and thoughts had been so strong that they had leaked into Chanyeol’s sleep and interrupted it, something he’s sure Jinah had never anticipated. Even till the end, he doubts she understood just how he woke up, so certain she was in her ill-bred conviction towards humanity and her own self-made fortress of thorns.

The last he had seen of Kyungsoo was when he had sent him off at the airport with his now awakened brother. Kyungsoo had lifted one hand in recognition before turning and walking away, a silent acknowledgement of all debts repaid. Chanyeol’s not sure where they are now, maybe Europe to hide until it all dies down.

Jinah’s hideout was cleared out by the rest of the force Baekhyun had brought, including the majority of the traditional vampires who had been using her umbrella of power as a safe hideaway, before everything is sealed away by a mountain of collapsed rubble. Chanyeol’s certain there’s still more of them out there, keeping their heads down for the time being, but his coven has agreed to work with the hunter division on identifying and eliminating the last of the traditionalists in order to usher in a new era of camaraderie and collaboration between the two races.

Unexpectedly, after the announcement of their partnership, several other vampire covens had stepped out of the dark with the intention of helping aid along the alliance. It seems that they had been hiding because of Jinah but had supported the promise of peace under the hunters’ rule all along and had just been too afraid of sticking their necks out in case of Jinah’s retribution. But with her dead, the title of the oldest vampire in the region now falls to Chanyeol, a role he isn’t entirely comfortable with but takes on nonetheless.

Chanyeol also starts to work with Junmyeon to begin implementing a training system for the hunters, veterans and new trainees alike, after months of seeing firsthand the general lack of knowledge surrounding vampires. Sehun and Jongin both volunteer to lead the teaching efforts, resulting in an interesting mix of grudging respect and adoration from the hunters.

The division is also thoroughly weeded out of spies, including the initial spy who had raided the morgue. They’re thrown into Korea’s worst jails under some punishment or other that the hunter division makes up with the support of the Korean government, as long as the hunters fulfill their promise of keeping the existence of vampires under wraps. That, too, is something Chanyeol wants to change, but he supposes he of all people can afford to take some baby steps.

A few weeks later, Chanyeol finishes the song he had been working on for almost the entirety of his time in Seoul, posts it on SoundCloud without telling Baekhyun, and waits. Sure enough, exactly three minutes and forty-seven seconds later, Baekhyun slams through the door of his studio, breathing hard.

“Wow, you really ran down here in twenty seconds.” Chanyeol takes a look at the song again, which is only three minutes and twenty-seven seconds long. “I’m guessing you liked it?”

“That—I—”

“You sounded amazing.”

The tips of Baekhyun’s ears glow red, and he shuffles in his spot. “Stop. No. My adlibs needed more work. How could you just—”

Chanyeol pouts. “Are you mad at me?”

Baekhyun points a finger at him. “That’s not fair. You know I can’t be mad that LOEY – I mean, you wrote a song about us. I just didn’t know it would sound _this good_. And your rap – holy shit.”

 _“Just like this, fall, fall, fall for you,”_ Chanyeol sings playfully, “Into your arms, fall, fall, I’m falling endlessly.” He holds out his arms, and though he rolls his eyes, Baekhyun folds himself into them.

“Leave the singing to me, how about that,” he says, before pressing a kiss to the corner of Chanyeol’s mouth. “Besides, it’s useless seducing me now. I already fell for you long, long ago.”

 

 

“I have something to tell you,” Chanyeol says to Baekhyun one day. He’s sitting on the bed in Baekhyun’s room – their room, now – and Baekhyun stands before him, bracketed by his knees.

“Does it really have to be now?” Baekhyun brushes their lips together again, eyes half-closed.

Chanyeol pulls away with some difficulty. “I think you’d want to know.”

Baekhyun sighs and straightens fully. “You have the worst timing, you know that?”

“So I’ve been asking around for the past few weeks, and... well, I believe I found your brother.”

“Baek... Baekbeom?” His voice is slow, as if he doesn’t know whether or not to believe him. Chanyeol reaches out a hand and links it with Baekhyun’s.

“Yeah. I didn’t want to tell you earlier in case I got your hopes up, but we’re almost sure it’s him. He’s in Bucheon with a small coven. I’m not sure if it’s his or if he joined them, but I booked a flight for the day after tomorrow, and—”

He’s cut off when Baekhyun literally throws himself on top of Chanyeol, knocking them both back onto the bed. His lips are suddenly busy with something else entirely, and he finds he doesn’t mind so much, especially when Baekhyun bites his lip aggressively and murmurs hotly, “I love you so fucking much, Park Chanyeol.” The bond echoes and jumps between them in flickers of electric pink lust and yellow gratitude.

Chanyeol flips them over so that he’s pressing Baekhyun into the bed, and he rolls their hips together in one long, smooth movement. Baekhyun grips the back of his shirt and wraps his legs around Chanyeol’s waist, bringing them even closer together, heat against heat, before fumbling for his shirt. Chanyeol does the same, although it’s substantially more difficult when Baekhyun’s legs are locked like a vice around his hips. Baekhyun takes advantage of when Chanyeol’s still tangled in removing his sweatshirt to grind his hips up again, causing Chanyeol to jolt and nearly lose his balance. He smirks cockily when Chanyeol finally frees himself and glares at him.

“You asked for this,” is all the warning Chanyeol gives before he sweeps a hand up the sensitive skin of Baekhyun’s side and lowers his head to nip at Baekhyun’s neck, lapping and sucking at where he knows Baekhyun is the most vulnerable. Sure enough, Baekhyun shudders apart beneath him in moans and whimpers, flushing beautifully across his cheeks.

When Chanyeol reaches the now healed wound, he pauses and pulls back a little to stare at it. The wound is barely visible under the pulsing, shifting form of his reinstated Mark, but it still burns at him to know that Jinah had gotten so close to tearing it out of Baekhyun.

“Don’t look at it,” Baekhyun says, bringing Chanyeol back to the present with a soft touch on his cheek. He twists his hand into Chanyeol’s hair and tugs down, until they’re pressed forehead to forehead, and all he can see are the flecks of brown reflected deep in Baekhyun’s eyes. “Look at me. Only me.”

This is what he should’ve been doing all along, Chanyeol realizes. Not getting lost in the haze of the past or worrying about the uncertainty of the future. This is the here and now. This is Baekhyun.

He slides down, kissing pretty marks down Baekhyun’s pale skin the entire way, and he undoes Baekhyun’s tight jeans deftly before tugging them down. He nips at the sensitive skin right inside Baekhyun’s leg, purposefully missing the most sensitive area of all until Baekhyun’s hand twists in his hair and he hisses, “Stop being such a damn tease and just— _oh_ —”

Like this, Baekhyun is pure heat in his mouth, heavy and hot and substantial. He licks tentatively before bobbing down and setting a slow, leisurely pace meant to tease and burn. Baekhyun’s thighs shake, draped over his shoulders, and his hand flexes where it’s tangled in his hair, as if he’s not quite sure whether he wants Chanyeol to hurry up or stop completely. Finally, he gasps between broken moans, “Please—wait— _Chanyeol_ —fuck—”

Chanyeol pulls off with one last swipe of his tongue and a self-satisfied smirk. Baekhyun glares at him balefully, chest heaving, still hard and leaking onto his stomach. “You fucker.”

“Yes, that’s what I’ll be doing,” Chanyeol says smartly, and Baekhyun kicks at him with one of his legs.

“Then hurry up and get on with it. I know you’re old, so maybe your stamina isn’t quite up to par, but—”

Chanyeol growls and Baekhyun laughs, sheer joy bubbling through their bond, filling him with a helium-like happiness. He quickly sheds the rest of his own clothes and proceeds to show Baekhyun just whose stamina ‘isn’t quite up to par.’

They both moan when he sinks into Baekhyun’s tight heat, slowly, inch by inch, until they’re pressed together in their most intimate places. There’s nothing but love, love, love pouring overwhelmingly through the bond, and he wraps his arms around Baekhyun and cradles him close to his chest.

“Does it hurt?” he can’t help but ask, though no traces of pain are leaking through.

Baekhyun clenches around him impatiently, and he twitches. “Move, dammit, or I’ll make you move. Fuck me, Chanyeol.”

His first thrust punches a shocked whimper from Baekhyun’s lips, and Chanyeol grins down at him. “You were saying?”

“Just keep _going_.” Baekhyun slings an arm around Chanyeol’s neck before pulling him down in a wet slide of tongues and lips.

Chanyeol knows it isn’t going to last very long, not with the heat building like a bonfire between them and the incredible intimacy of the bond. Baekhyun filters nothing, and every emotion hits Chanyeol with the weight and speed of a sandbag, burying and captivating him at the same time. He lowers his head to mouth again at the Mark – _his_ Mark – on Baekhyun’s neck, and when he presses his teeth lightly against it in silent invitation, he feels the trust burst through the bond, a silent consent.

“Chanyeol!” Baekhyun shudders and arches against him when he bites down, hands scrabbling down Chanyeol’s back, and a damp wetness wells between them where their chests are pressed together. Baekhyun tightens with his climax almost painfully around Chanyeol, and finally, it pulls him over the brink as well.

The glow is twice as intense because of the double feedback Chanyeol receives from his own body and Baekhyun’s. When it finally dies down, he finds himself collapsed on top of Baekhyun.

“You okay?” Baekhyun pats his cheek. “As lovely as this is, you’re really heavy and you’re kind of suffocating me.”

“Oh, sorry.” Chanyeol rolls off to the side, licking his lips. Baekhyun’s blood is as sweet as ever, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever get sick of the taste.

“You look like you felt really good.” Baekhyun props himself up on an elbow. There’s honest curiosity in his eyes when he asks, “Does it really feel that different with the bond?”

“It’s like being utterly and completely surrounded by you in every way. Your emotions, your mind, your touch. I’m inside you, figuratively and literally—”

Baekhyun slaps a hand over Chanyeol’s lips, and he grins at Baekhyun’s embarrassed flush. “Okay, enough, I get it.” Chanyeol can’t resist the urge to lick at Baekhyun’s palm, and the hunter yelps before he withdraws his hand. “Gross!”

“Don’t tell me you’re getting shy now,” Chanyeol teases before he leans over and presses a damp, open kiss to Baekhyun’s lips. It’s slow and sweet, the both of them too lazy to do anything more.

“What if I wanted to try the bond too?” Baekhyun murmurs against his lips. “I think it’s kind of unfair that you get to have all the fun.”

Chanyeol tries to pull back, but Baekhyun anchors him in place with his arms around his neck like a particularly clingy octopus. His eyes are serious as he looks at Chanyeol, and Chanyeol wants more than anything to reciprocate the bond. But he can’t ask Baekhyun of this—

( _“You know you can tell me anything, right?”_

 _“You could’ve just told me. Everything. The Marks, the reason behind the murders, your mentor. I wouldn’t have pushed you away.”_ )

Maybe.

Maybe he can.

Maybe he’s allowed to deserve Baekhyun. Maybe he’s allowed to keep him.

“You’ll have to give up your life as a human. You’ll be confined to the night for at least years until you become stronger, and you’ll crave blood so much that it’ll drive you mad. If I’m your mentor, I might become power-crazy and abusive one day. I might hurt you, and you wouldn’t be able to escape. Do you really want this?”

Baekhyun frees one hand to deliberately cover the Mark on Chanyeol’s left bicep. It tingles beneath his touch. “Do you love me?”

“Unconditionally,” he replies automatically.

“Then listen. You are not Im Jinah.” Baekhyun enunciates each word slowly, and stares at Chanyeol dead in the eyes. Something like relief and the last dredges of his guilt trickle slowly, slowly, slowly out of him. “You are better than her. You care about humanity. You are Park Chanyeol.” He smiles Chanyeol’s favorite smile, the one that’s so genuine and pure that it aches. “I guess forever at your side wouldn’t be so terrible.”

It’s a long moment before Chanyeol whispers, “You mean it?”

Baekhyun shrugs nonchalantly. “Not right now, obviously. Maybe in a few months, or years, whenever the time is right. Besides, I can’t stand knowing that I have to share this Mark with Sehun, and that I don’t get to leave a Mark on you in return.” He thumbs over the black Mark again. “I want the whole world to know who you belong to now, just like how everyone knows I belong to you.”

He yelps in surprise when Chanyeol rolls over and pulls Baekhyun on top of him, kissing him deeply. When they separate, Chanyeol asks, voice purposefully low, “So what’s that about my stamina again?”

Baekhyun laughs, bright and loud, before he lowers his lips and brushes them against Chanyeol’s ear. “If you wanted to go again, all you had to do was ask.”

Like the sunset, their bond glows, and glows, and glows, fading pinks and oranges and blues, an iridescent watercolor of ever-changing emotions.

And like the sunset, their love is nothing but eternal.

 

 

 _Yeah, lies are bitter, even though I know, lies are bitter_  
_I said I fell for you but you made me fall so deep_  
_I can see endlessly, you come inside and suffocate me_  
_I lost everything, can’t turn it back_

 _I’m drinking in meaningless breaths_  
_Tell me before the sun wakes up_  
_Send yourself forever into my arms_  
_Feels like I’m locked up every time I breathe_

 _Just like this, fall, fall, fall for you_  
_Into your arms, fall, fall, I’m falling_  
_Endlessly_

 _Feels so far away_  
_Only you are allowed for me in this moment_  
_Fall, fall, into you_  
_I’m falling_


End file.
